Blown call changed Sooners' fortunes

Playing the what-if game is a pointless exercise. The past doesn’t change.

But let’s play anyway.

How might the college football landscape have changed had officials not blown a call with 66 seconds left in the Oklahoma-Oregon game on Sept. 16, costing the Sooners a victory?

Oklahoma finished the regular season 10-2. Would a one-loss Sooners team have been part of the national championship debate?

Would they have been ranked ahead of Florida and Michigan in the BCS standings?

Would they be in the Valley not to play Boise State in the Fiesta Bowl, but Ohio State in the BCS national championship game?

“They might have been in the debate, but they easily would have been the worst one-loss team in the computer,” said Jerry Palm, who runs the Web site CollegeBCS.com. “I don’t think they would have had a realistic shot. Even if they were No. 2 in the polls, which they probably wouldn’t have been, the weakness of the Big 12 would have hurt them in the computer in terms of strength of schedule.”

For those unaware of the controversy surrounding the Oklahoma-Oregon game, here’s a recap:

The Ducks trailed, 33-27, when they attempted an onside kick with 1:06 left. Officials gave Oregon possession even though a Ducks player committed an infraction by touching the football before it went 10 yards.

Even worse, the play was reviewed but replay official Gordon Riese wasn’t provided the camera angle that clearly showed the infraction.

Oregon scored the game-winning touchdown with 46 seconds left, and Oklahoma was left to wonder what might have been.

“I knew it was done then,” coach Bob Stoops said of his team’s national title chances.

The botched call set off a national debate about instant replay. In Norman,

Okla., it was all anybody talked about for days, if not weeks.

“No matter who we were playing, or how good they were, it was always, 'What about that call at Oregon, man,’ ” linebacker Zach Latimer said.

The Sooners were still suffering a hangover when they were beaten by Texas, 28-10, three weeks later. The defeat, however, might have been the best thing that happened to Stoops’ club.

Oklahoma could no longer grouse about having lost an opportunity to play for the national title. It had to re-focus on an attainable goal — winning the Big 12 championship.

“We could dwell on the past or save the rest of the year,” Latimer said.

The Sooners won seven straight games to close the regular season then humbled Nebraska, 21-7, in the conference championship game.

That earned them a trip to the Valley, and while they’d prefer to be arriving next week, they seem to have finally gotten the Oregon game out of their system.

“We’re here playing in a great bowl against Boise State,” linebacker Rufus Alexander said. “We don’t even dwell on the Oregon loss anymore. Everybody else made a fuss about it. We just kept on winning.”

Latimer hoped to one day tell his children that he played in the national championship game.

That won’t happen. But he’s come up with an alternative game plan.

“I’ll say, 'Yeah, I was in Glendale,’ ” he said, a smile on his face. “You can look it up.”