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Sooners already thinking repeat
By Joe Wojciechowski
ESPN.com
Bob Stoops' voice was scratchy and his eyes had bags on top of the bags from staying up all night, but there he was in his red OU sweater, hands folded sitting a few feet away from a pair of national championship trophies just smiling.
It didn't take much to prompt the grin, a quick question wondering if the Sooners could possibly top this season after winning OU's seventh national title and going 13-0 for the first time.
|  | | The Sooners found their Orange Bowl success particularly sweet. |
"Not unless we're going to play a preseason game, win the Big 12 championship and then win the national championship. I guess that would be 14-0 and that's about the only place you can go from here," Stoops said. "But doing it again would be pretty special, too. And Oklahoma has done that before, I think."
Typical Stoops. Confident in his team, his coaches, his system. And with good reason. This isn't something from out of nowhere, this Oklahoma national championship. This is something that started two years ago when Stoops was hired, snowballed after losing a bowl game last year and turned into an avalanche of success this season.
While doing it in the second season may be slightly ahead of the curve, Stoops expected this to happen.
"We never had a timetable. We didn't come out the first month and say what we were going to win. We said let's learn how to go through a winter workout like we're supposed to. Let's train in a way that athletes train to give us a chance to win," Stoops said.
"And then we get into spring ball and we talked about learning how to play football on the field the correct way," he said. "Then summer, same thing - let's learn how to get ourselves in condition to compete for a championship. It's an evolving process working week-to-week and month-to-month to improve."
Safe to say, it's working, but it took awhile. At first, they complete an offseason conditioning workout under coach Jerry Schmidt. Soon, they could. At first, they didn't understand the Stoops way. Soon, they did.
The Sooners finished 7-5 last season, stung by a 27-25 loss to Ole Miss in the Independence Bowl.
"We weren't capable of finishing that game," Stoops said. "We understood we were right on the verge of having a good, strong season - and it was good - but I believe that game made them hungrier. They had a taste of it all season and we wanted to finish all those games this year."
Mission accomplished. The Sooners were 6-0 against ranked teams, including wins against then No. 1 Nebraska, No. 2 FSU and No. 3 Kansas State. They even beat K-State again in the Big 12 title game for good measure.
Add in Texas and Texas A&M and this was not a team that wilted under pressure. And for all the talk about Florida State having the edge in big game experience, here's the kicker - only one of the those five games was in Norman.
"We felt we played the tougher schedule," Stoops said. "What Nebraska and Kansas State did in their bowl games speaks for itself. People didn't want to talk about that, but we understood it and our players recognized we were prepared for this."
But are they prepared to repeat? The players think so.
"We want to defend out national championship," said linebacker Rocky Calmus. "We'll enjoy this for awhile and start lifting in two weeks."
That's the type of attitude that brings a smile to a weary coach's face. Stoops knows he has plenty of talent to make a run for the Rose Bowl, the site of next year's BCS title game.
While the Sooners lose stars like Heisman runner up Josh Heupel and Orange Bowl MVP Torrance Marshall, they return 14 starters and 44 players on the two deep roster. Wait, it gets better. Of those 44 players on the two-deep returning, 23 are freshman and sophomores. Want more? Among the starters returning are Calmus and three of four starters in the secondary on defense and all the receivers, RB Quentin Griffin and most of the line.
The Sooners could be around for a little while.
"You don't usually hear this about a team that went 13-0, but we area young football team," Stoops said. "There's no question the foundation, discipline and hard work and toughness these seniors have started in the past two years will carry on to those younger players.
"We expect to have great years."
Joe Wojciechowski is the college football editor at ESPN.com
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