THREE

THREE

There are a lot of things that come in three’s. There are 3 wheels on a tricycle, 3 sides to a triangle, 3 primary colors and 3 little kittens who lost their mittens.  There are 3 Blind Mice, 3 Billy Goats Gruff, 3 French Hens and 3 Little Pigs who had to deal with a wolf more than once.

You can knock three times, you’re granted three wishes and the third times the charm…but supposedly death and bad luck come in threes, three strikes you’re out and three, as the saying goes, is a crowd.  Stooges, Wise Men, Tenors and Amigo’s come in three…so do Musketeers, Witches of Eastwick and Men in a Tub, but I’d stay away from those 3-ring circuses, if it were me.

Sometimes things that come in three can be a wonderful thing…like #3 Derrick Shepard, All-American Selmon brothers, and the number of National Championship rings owned by Bud & Barry.  But sometimes three isn’t so great…like Jaws III, living close to 3 Mile Island or a having a close encounter of the third kind.

Three is also what will define the Oklahoma Sooners 2015 football season…Three games - in three weeks - against three top ten ranked opponents.

Yes, the next three weeks is what will determine and define a season that still holds the hope and optimism of winning out and making the college football playoffs…as well as the possibility of it ending like last year...with the Sooners receiving an ass kicking from a 4^th place ACC team in the Russell Athletic Bowl in mid-December.

Yes, it’s all right there in front of the Sooners.  To win the Big 12 Conference and give themselves a shot at being in the playoffs, all they need to do is win the next three games.  No big deal, right? It’s as easy as A, B, C or one, two, three.  I mean come on, after all, it’s not like they haven’t done it before.  Hell, since 1950, the Sooners have won three straight games 59 times.  If you think about it, that number would probably be a lot higher, but when you don’t lose a game for 6 years in the 50’s and have registered more 10 win seasons than any other school in the history of college football, the opportunity to start many winning streaks in minimal.  Throw in the fact that the Sooners are 114-36 all-time against the next three opponents listed on the schedule and you’d think that winning out would be as easy as using a camera to attract a Kardashian...but times, they are a changin’.

Yes, I’ll admit…it still sounds strange that Baylor, TCU and OSU is a treacherous three game gauntlet, but it is. It’s also arguably the toughest three game stretch the Sooners have seen since they beat #11 Texas, #2 K-State (road) and #1 Nebraska (home) in their historic ‘Red October’ run to the National Championship back in 2000.  But unlike 2000, the Sooners won’t get the benefit of a bye week like they did before playing Nebraska, and two of these three will be on the road.

Can the Sooners do it? Yes.  Will they do it?  I’d like to say yes, but I just can’t.  Nothing that Mike Stoops has done since he’s been back gives me any confidence or indication that he’s capable of coming up with an effective defensive game plan to stop any of the three high-powered offenses the Sooners are about to face.  To think otherwise, well, I’d have to be three-sheets to the wind.

Three games. Win all three and this season, much like the 3 mice, 3 kittens, 3 goats and 3 men in a tub, becomes a fairy-tale…which, as we all know, end with everyone living happily ever-after.

Lose all three? Well, guys…I guess we can always go back to dreaming about the other fairy-tale we have that involves the number three…

Just the opinion of one mildly interested person

Buddy Putty - The Overweight Armchair Sooner