Tulane

 Welcome back loyal reader(s)! It is the dawn of yet another season here at The Steamroller. It's been a pretty exciting off-season, which is a relative scale to say the least, and we are on the cusp of another college football season. Since we last were here, our beloved Sooners, and texas have made the decision to move to the SEC. Essentially creating one conference to dominate them all and leaving the rest of the college football landscape to lurk in the shadows. The Big 12, and any lingering remnants of the Big 8 (I'm an old bastard), will finally be extinguished. I'm torn on this because I'm nostalgic, but also realistically this is a good thing for OU. No matter, it will be fun. I digress, on to the season at hand...

OU finds themselves unexpectedly in the friendly confines of Owen Field today. As most (all?, because c'mon, no one reads this that I don't force to) of you know, my wife and I live in New Orleans. The city was hammered by Hurricane Ida last weekend, and large parts of the city still do not have electricity. It's a sad state, but New Orleans is resilient and this too shall pass. In the meantime, a football game at Tulane was not feasible. So, the Green Wave are making their way up to the Sooner State for the season opener. In spite of the fact that OU is surrounded by the most optimism in probably a decade, Tulane is not a pushover. Couple that with a very real rallying point of overcoming a natural disaster to play this game, I think the Sooners have their work cut out for them. 

Offense

The Sooners got some bad news this week when it was announced that potential break-out player, WR Theo Wease would miss "several weeks" with a leg injury. The only silver lining to that is that WR is probably where the Sooners have the most depth. Nevertheless, it's a big loss as Wease is no Judge Smails, i.e. a slouch. In spite of that, the Sooners offense appears to be "loaded." They return almost every major skill player except Rhamondre Stevenson. But, while his loss hurts, they get back Kennedy Brooks (last season opt-out) and raise you one Eric Gray (transfer from Tennessee). Not to mention, the presumptive Heisman favorite Spencer Rattler at QB. I'm fully a firm chub at the thought of this. While I think Rattler has a great game today, I'm picking Kennedy Brooks today. I think by the end of the season that Brooks is established as one of the top 5 backs in the country. He sets the bar today with 100+ rushing yards and a TD. 

Defense

This portion of the column has been such a shitshow the last decade or so that I often don't even bother. However, I think this year might be a little different. Are the Sooners going to be a top 5 defense? No, they are not. But, they don't have to be either. They simply have to be adequate. And I am very optimistic they might actually be adequate. I hope that wasn't the jinx to end them all. Today I like Nik Bonitto. Dude was a beast last year and I think he picks up where he left off and leads a quietly solid defense today.

Score 

The line has OU winning by 32. I love the Sooners and I am cautiously optimistic about the season from a Playoff perspective. But, Tulane has talent.  I like the Sooners to win, but I'm taking Tulane to cover city. OU wins 41-21. It's good to be back.

Boomer to the Motherfuckin Sooner