Oklahoma Sooners Football: How to Cope After a Loss

Okay, Sooner fans... we’re all in considerable pain. Yesterday afternoon and evening, all of you found different ways to make it through the day, and you’ll likely be repeating the process for the rest of the weekend.

I’ve gotten much better at coping with losses over the years. As a child, I’d sometimes cry about it because I was a little bitch that didn’t know how to handle disappointment. In high school, I’d start arguments with my parents because that was what I did in most situations regardless of the circumstances. Early in college, I’d get extra drunk, make a fool of myself and try to forget what had happened that day. Now that I have more experience with losses, my coping has become more nuanced (not really). Here is the list of my favorite ways to handle a loss.

5. Complaining

Anger and frustration help to push away sadness, so venting about how the game went is a good way to go about things. There is always one constant with this: It is NEVER a case of the other team being better than OU (in your mind). It is always a case of OU blowing it and being stupid. It’s always good to be as irrational as possible in these situations. Don’t ever let facts or logic get in the way.

4. Food

I’m a chunky dude. Not obese, but definitely portly. Thin enough get girls (in The South), but big enough to where I have to bring my A-game (a rarity). Anyway, this means I like to eat, and eating is a solution to problems such as boredom, sadness and anger. Leftover tailgate food is clutch as hell after an L.

3. Booze and other substances

This is the No. 1 solution for most people, but you have to be careful with this one. Once last season’s Orange Bowl started to take a turn for the worse (or worst?), so did Sooner fans. We had a room rented at The Speakeasy in OKC, and a Clemson touchdown led to a PBR tall boy being Gronk-spiked on the wood floor (and then the wall) by a prematurely-greying portly gentleman capable of wooing Southern girls on rare occasions (I won’t name names). The downward spiral continued from there, as Fireball shot after Fireball shot went into that person’s belly. The night ended with him being ditched by his friends at Edna’s and having to hitch a ride all the way to Edmond on New Year’s Eve. The moral of the story is that you need to not let yourself fly off the rails because of a poor effort from your favorite football team.

2. Schadenfreude

How much fun did you have watching LSU end the game by throwing a pick and blowing a dude up after the whistle? I THOROUGHLY enjoyed it. More pleasure barely eluded by grasp after A&M was able to recover and pull out a win in OT. Sunday night will be spent rooting against Texas, because that’s the best way to avoid thinking about OU’s misfortunes.

1. Sleep

OU has opened the season with a convincing win over Houston. The Sooners will enter the Ohio State matchup as the No. 3 team in the land and are hosting College Gameday. Things are looking good in Norman, and people are asking themselves, “Is this the year Bob breaks through?”. Olivia Munn gives you a call to tell you that she’s breaking up with Aaron Rodgers and would like to take you on an all-inclusive trip to...”

You awake to the sight of your own room. You’re a bit disappointed, but you’ve briefly forgotten about the piss-poor effort from OU the day before. Then realization hits, and you go back to sleep.

You know how students at other schools say, “Win or lose, we still party”? For OU students and fans, its “Win, and we have fun like we normally would on a Saturday night. Lose, and we’ll be in our room until Monday”.