University of Oklahoma Football

An Interactive Guide to the World of Sports

Daniel J. Brush, David Horne, Marc CB Maxwell

• Publisher: Savas Beatie
• Year: 2007
• eBook ISBN: 9781611210279

The first title in the new, exciting, and completely original Sports by the Numbers series!The University of Oklahoma Sooners Football program has produced seven national championship teams, four Heisman Trophy winners, and countless legendary coaches, players, and characters. This inaugural book in the new Sports by the Numbers franchise unlocks the captivating history of this football program by providing OU fans with Sooners history in a fresh, provocative, and unique numerical framework.The format created by the authors distinguishes Sports by the Numbers from everything else available today. University of Oklahoma Football is composed of ten chapters, each offering one hundred numbered factual “mini-stories”—facts, anomalies, records, coincidences, and enthralling lore and trivia. Each chapter begins with an introduction that highlights the many exciting stories detailed in that chapter.The Sports by the Numbers team has you covered, from “Personal Events” stories that include the following: “101: US Army Airborne unit (101st) that OU All-American Bob Kalsu was assigned to during the Vietnam conflict. Kalsu was drafted by the Buffalo Bills in 1968 and played in the NFL for one year before being called to duty. On July 21, 1970, Kalsu was killed in action, making him the only active professional football player to be killed in Vietnam.”
... to statistical entries like the following:
“846: Number of yards passing (846) by QB Beryl Clark during the 1939 season, his last at OU. Sixty-four years later, QB Jason White surpassed Clark’s total by exactly 3, 000 yards, finishing the 2003 season with 3, 846 yards in the air.”Oklahoma fans will cheer as Sports by the Numbers dedicates pages to renowned names like Bob Stoops (current OU coach), Barry Switzer (legendary coach, 1973-1988), Bud Wilkinson (coach, 1947-1963), Billy Sims (Heisman Trophy winner), Steve Owens (running back), Jason White (Heisman Trophy winner), the defensive Selmon family trio of Lee Roy, Lucious, and Dewey, Billy Vessels (halfback), Brian Bosworth (linebacker), Josh Heupel (quarterback), and many, many more.Sports by the Numbers books are not just for die-hard sports fans, but for every fan and sports history reader who loves sports and wants to know more about their heroes and favorite franchise. Sports by the Numbers books will quench any fan’s thirst for entertainment and knowledge.

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Also by
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• For Joseph
• Contents
• Foreword
• Preface / Acknowledgments
• The “Locker”
• Chapter 1 The First 100, or Why the Three Selmon Brothers from Eufaula, Oklahoma, Embody the Spirit of OU Football
• Chapter 2 Sooners and Soldiers, or How One OU All-American Left the Field of Play and Became Immortal as an American Hero on the Field of Battle
• Chapter 3 Where 83,000 Screaming Sooners Come Each Saturday to Find a Piece of Home—a Home That Will Never be Completely Built
• Chapter 4 How One Oklahoma Legend Stood in the Eye of the Hurricane and Weathered the Storm
• Chapter 5 Oklahoma Hearts Josh…Forever
• Chapter 6 Why One Texan May be Considered the Greatest Sooner Team Player in Recent Oklahoma History
• Chapter 7 Why Players Risk Life and Limb During a Shootout in Dallas for a 10-gallon Cowboy Hat That You Can’t Even Wear
• Chapter 8 Why Players Risk Life and Limb During a Shootout in Dallas for a 10-gallon Cowboy Hat That You Can’t Even Wear
• Chapter 9 When You’re a Guy Named Joe and You Hire a Guy Named Bob, People Will Call You a Genius
• Chapter 10 The Streak
• Bibliography