September 28, 2008 01:02 pm
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NORMAN — It looked like a YouTube lesson in precision passing in the first quarter Saturday at Owen Field.
Sam Bradford cocked his throwing arm and found Manuel Johnson in stride 45 yards downfield. TCU cornerback Rafael Priest, three yards behind him at the point of the catch, had no prayer.
The end result: a 73-yard touchdown strike on a night for both Bradford and Johnson to remember. Again and again and particularly in the first 15 minutes, No. 2 Oklahoma bypassed the opportunity to challenge the nation’s leading rushing defense and instead ffrom a no-huddle offense riddled a man-up TCU secondary in what became a 35-10 victory.
Bradford threw for a career-best 411 yards, breaking a first-quarter passing record with 199 yards previously held by Jason White (184 vs. Baylor in 2003), as OU bolted to a 21-3 lead.
Johnson’s catch was his first of three touchdown catches on the way to a five-catch, 206-yard night that broke Mark Clayton’s single-game mark, also in 2003 against Texas, of 190 yards.
Bradford mused at the use of the word precision on the first throw to his record-holding receiver.
“To be honest with you, I saw him momentarily when I threw it and then lost track of him in the crowd and I was just waiting to hear whether the crowd went crazy or not to tell what happened,” he said.
Johnson’s take? “The corner wasn’t lined up right and you know, I wasn’t exactly sure he was throwing at me but I had my guy beat so I just put my head down and ran underneath it,” he said.
It wasn’t all that simple, but it was a simple game plan. OU gave up the rushing game, opting for it 36 times for an average of 0.7 yards per attempt. The 25-yard total will certainly keep the No. 24 Frogs (4-1) atop the rushing defense category which they led with a 32-yard average coming in.
“They filled the box and when you do that, I like our chances going man all across the field,” Bradford said.
The record-breaker came when Bradford picked up a Frogs blitz and found Johnson on a 63-yard catch-and-run with 5:38 on the third-quarter clock. Those catches bookended a 55-yard second quarter combination that made it 28-3 at halftime.
OU coach Bob Stoops was complimentary of both players, but got more pointed with Johnson’s performance, calling it the best by a receiver he’d seen in his 10 years as the team’s head coach.
Clearly, this would not be a repeat of 2005’s 17-10 disaster here, TCU’s biggest upset in 45 years. In that game, Rhett Bomar and Paul Thompson combined for a grand total of 128 passing yards.
Clearly, these aren’t those Sooners, who for what it’s worth, with 72 days until it really matters, did their part in the argument over who will be voted the nation’s top-ranked team today. Following Southern California’s collapse at Oregon State on Thursday, the Southeastern Conference did a little beating up on itself with No. 3 Georgia losing to Alabama and No. 4 Florida falling to Ole Miss and former Arkansas coach Houston Nutt’s team.
Count on the Sooners (4-0) being No. 1 for the first time in five years in both the Associated Press and the USA Today poll when they are released this afternoon. But the amount of meaning that had for Stoops became clear with the first question fired at him following his radio show.
“Talk to someone else about it,” he said.
And so Bradford had his turn.
“Too early for any of that,” he said.
And they’re right.
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Photos
Mike Kays.