Oklahoma Football: Sooners look to make statement in Lubbock
Oklahoma Football travels to Lubbock to take on Texas Tech as they look to make a statement to the college football playoff committee.
Oklahoma debuted at No. 7 in the first playoff rankings this year, behind three other one-loss teams. Coming off of a beatdown of Kansas State in Norman, Oklahoma will be looking to make a statement this weekend in an effort to prove to the committee that they are the premier one-loss team in the country.
The Sooners have rebounded from their Red River loss to Texas with consecutive bludgeonings of overmatched opponents. The competition ramps up as the final month of the regular season begins, and it all starts for Oklahoma in Lubbock against Texas Tech.
The Red Raiders suffered a disappointing loss to Iowa State in Ames last weekend in a game that was riddled with miscues, from a litany of turnovers to ill-timed penalties. A win could have positioned Kliff Kingsbury‘s team to make a run at inclusion in the Big 12 title game, even with a loss to Oklahoma this week.
Instead, the margin-for-error has evaporated and in order to get back into conference championship contention, Texas Tech must pull the upset over Oklahoma on Saturday night, something that has thus far evaded Kingsbury during his tenure.
Here’s how you can watch Saturday night’s battle between the Sooners and Red Raiders:
Date: Saturday, November 3
Time: 8:00 p.m. ET
Location: Lubbock, Texas
Venue: Jones AT&T Stadium
TV: ABC
Live Stream: WatchESPN | FuboTV
Keys to Victory
Oklahoma will look to maintain some balance offensively against a much improved Texas Tech run defense. The Red Raiders used to be routinely gashed on the ground, but they’ve improved to 42nd in the country this season against the run. The Sooners are just as good running the ball as they are throwing it, but they would be more comfortable if they could open up some running lanes for Trey Sermon and Kennedy Brooks instead of putting it all on Kyler Murray‘s shoulders.
Texas Tech seems overmatched, even at home, so they’ll need to force some turnovers against an Oklahoma team that is very careful with the football. The Sooners have only turned it over six times this whole season, which is tied for fourth best in the FBS. Along with that, Texas Tech will want to avoid obvious passing situations by staying ahead of the chains. No one will mistake Oklahoma’s defense for Michigan’s, but they’ve been good on passing downs, ranking 18th in the country in passing down success rate, per S&P+.
Betting Odds
Odds courtesy of oddsshark.com
Point Spread: Oklahoma -13.5
Over/Under: 77
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Prediction
While Texas Tech’s defense has improved, they are still routinely getting lit up through the air, ranking 117th in the FBS in passing defense. That’s bad news against one of the most efficient and deadly QB’s in the country in Kyler Murray, who has a couple of receivers in Marquise Brown and CeeDee Lamb who are capable of making big plays down the field. Murray will hit several big plays against this beleaguered secondary, and while Alan Bowman and the Red Raiders offense will keep pace for a while, it’ll eventually get away from them as the Sooners pull away in the fourth quarter.
Final Score: Oklahoma 52, Texas Tech 35