re: Red River Shootout History

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Ahh the Greg Davis offense

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GDGD, as we called him.

As far as I know, Lott lives in OK

I sat near him at the 2019 spring football game.

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1970: Shockingly, w/OU's coaching staff in trouble, Royal paid back Wilkinson's loyalty to him & ordered Bellard to reveal the technical details of the Wishbone to Switzer, who'd be making contact w/him shortly.

Bellard, following orders, helped Switzer figure out the timing issues & several critical details that had befuddled OU going back to Wilkinson's Split-T, which he'd failed to evolve into a Triple Option. Switzer returned to Norman w/the wisdom in tow.

1970: OU debuted its version of the Wishbone & was promptly hammered, 41-9, at the Cotton Bowl.

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Just to clarify... this is not exactly how this happened although this version has been spread throughout Texas lately...

OU changed their offense from the I to the Houston Veer in spring of 1970. Switzer DID NOT go to the Texas staff at this time like people seem to think.

OU ran the veer for the first couple of games that year and the offense was ineffective. They had an open date prior to Texas and Switzer talked head coach Chuck Fairbanks into SECRETLY switching to the wishbone.

OU sprang the wishbone on Royal and the Longhorns in that game and promptly got thrashed 41-9 (as mentioned). The Sooners ended up 7-4-1.

It was AFTER the 1970 season that Switzer asked about talking to the Texas coaches about the wishbone. It was done through Wade Walker...OU's new athletic director... who was Royal's OU teammate and the guy who followed Royal as head coach at Mississippi State.

Royal had Bellard talk to Switzer as a favor to Wade Walker. The entire encounter was done via phone calls and exchange of film and occurred prior to spring practice in 1971.

I don’t care what program it is, I love the detailed history of any program’s history put on here, especially history of rivalries. I knew a lot of the above about the RRSO but some I didn’t. Always good to know more. Great work as always OU Guy!

frick Texsa, is how I look at the game.

But I did similar posts for Tenn and Aub games except focused on them. I truly wanted non OU/tx SEC fans to fully understand how much rich history there is and how intertwined the 2 teams are. This game takes a backseat to no one. Doesn’t lessen the other rivalry games either, but there is just no other game like this one. SEC got a classic to add to their portfolio.

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