Big 12 football 2018 Power Rankings: Oklahoma steady at No. 1 in Week 10

I have quite a few thoughts on Texas that can’t really be directly connected, and would do better as individual thoughts, so I’ll divide them as such.

• Sam Ehlinger is awesome. He’s a top ten quarterback in the country, and he outplayed Will Grier on Saturday. He’s improving every week, and I think with better play calling, this offense could be really good.
• The play calling still isn’t good. Tim Beck is still the offensive coordinator, and his system is still just stale. He doesn’t have a game flow, he doesn’t adapt to what defenses are doing, and that cost them here.
• Texas needs their defensive backfield to grow up quickly, and they just haven’t yet. I think their young group back there of Caden Sterns, Anthony Cook, BJ Foster and Josh Thompson are going to be great next year, but they aren’t consistent enough, and that showed against WVU.

Iowa State did exactly what they were supposed to do, disposing of Kansas easily. They didn’t blow them out or anything, but it was never really in doubt, and that’s all they needed. Brock Purdy keeps improving, as does Hakeem Butler, and this defense is just terrifying. I think Iowa State is running the table for the rest of the year, all the way to a conference title game appearance. They look really great.

I’m still skeptical of West Virginia defense, rushing attack, and well, everything after their win over Texas, but they deserve the second spot in the rankings this week. They played a good game against the Longhorns, and thanks to the excellent play of Will Grier, and a surprising amount of success in the running game, they were able to win a shootout. Credit to Dana Holgorsen too for that two-point conversion decision. He knew he had the best player on the field, and let him make a play.

I doubt West Virginia can beat Oklahoma in three weeks, but it seems to have as good a chance as anyone at this point.

Oklahoma started super slow, as Kyler Murray tossed two interceptions and the Sooners went down 14-0 in the first quarter. From that point on, it was pretty much all Oklahoma though, as they cut the deficit to seven on their next drive, and three at the end of the first half.

It’s too bad that the second half was defined by the loss of Alan Bowman for Texas Tech, but I really don’t think this game was as close as the five point difference indicates. Oklahoma never really seemed to be in danger here.