Oklahoma Sooners Football: West Virginia Recap

Oklahoma and West Virginia braved the snow in Morgantown in a game that was chippy before it even started. In the end, the Sooners came away victorious, 56-28. Here's how it happened.

Oklahoma started with the ball, and the weather appeared to be an immediate factor, with OU dropping two passes. Fortunately for the Sooners, their punt was muffed by West Virginia and Oklahoma recovered. The game was over for the most part before West Virginia’s offense came onto the field. Oklahoma seemed to learn from their struggles on the first drive, electing to run on every play of their second-chance drive, which ended with a Samaje Perine touchdown from the two-yard-line.

West Virginia punted after a three-and-out, and Oklahoma answered with a 75 yard screen pass to Dede Westbrook, who once again broke 100 yards receiving in the game.

West Virginia appeared to be preparing for their first touchdown, but they fumbled at the end of an 83 yard drive. It seemed that the Sooners would waste the opportunity, but a roughing the punter penalty gave them new life, and Joe Mixon ended the drive with a touchdown run. West Virginia again drove the length of the field, but once again fumbled in the endzone, and the Sooners ran the ball the other way, ending with a Perine touchdown run. West Virginia scored on their next drive, and the Sooners happily took their 34-7 lead into the half.

Jordan Evans recorded his third interception in the last two games to start the second half and took the pick all the way to endzone, and the Sooners led 41-7.

From there, Oklahoma returned to their all-too-familiar "coast mode," allowing the Mountaineers to bring the score to 41-28 before finally answering with two Baker Mayfield touchdown runs to ice the game.

Oklahoma did what they needed to do early, scoring on their redzone chances, and the Sooners also controlled the turnover battle due to the plentiful fumbles by West Virginia in the snow. A game that once seemed like a blowout started to feel like anything but, but Oklahoma's ability to flip the switch on offense when it needs to allowed it to move comfortably ahead to finish the game doubling its opponent's score on the road.

It won't go down as a dominating win, as the Sooners allowed 579 yards and only gained 485. Mayfield's day also won't appear dominant on the scoreboard, as he went 9/15 for 169 yards, but he did throw two touchdowns to his one interception. Oklahoma was gashed by the run game (388 yards allowed), but they won the turnover battle and ran for 316 yards of their own, and that proved enough to carry the day in Morgantown.