Happy Hump Day, friends and fans!

Yesterday, three legendary Oklahoma Sooners were revealed to be 2021 College Football Hall of Fame ballot inclusions. Among 85 total candidates are BCS National Champions and All-Americans Josh Heupel and Roy Williams, along with OU’s all-time winningest head coach Bob Stoops.

Currently, there are a total of 27 Sooners in the Hall, including 22 players and five coaches. With this nomination, Stoops has a chance to become the sixth Oklahoma coach to be inducted into the College Football HOF, joining Barry Switzer, Jim Tatum, Bud Wilkinson, Lawrence ‘Biff’ Jones and Bennie Owen. Considering the turn-around he led to bring OU back to sustained national relevancy, his status as the program’s all-time wins leader, and his undefeated run for the crystal ball in 2000, the case for Stoops is about as strong as they come.

Heupel has the chance to become the first OU QB to enter the Hall. Meanwhile, Williams could become just the second safety in program history to be immortalized as a Hall of Famer, joining class of 2019 inductee Rickey Dixon.

This class of Hall of Fame inductees will be announced early next year, followed by a commemorative banquet on Dec. 7, 2021 presented by the National Football Foundation.

Now onto today’s Hot Links! OU is QBU, Sooner Hoops makes another non-conference contest official, Mo Gaba is awesome and more!

OU Links

• Oh, this? It’s just a video of Dallas Cowboys rookie WR CeeDee Lamb doing things I could literally never dream of without completely obliterating my knees and ankles beyond repair.

• 247Sports’ Barton Simmons devised a scoring system to rank the modern day QBU, and after crunching the numbers Oklahoma comfortably takes the crown.
• 2021 four-star WR verbal commit Cody Jackson plays for Foster High School in Richmond, Texas. If that sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the same HS one Cedarian Lamb played for before he became a Sooner. In a recent interview, Jackson declared that his game was a blend of Lamb and Marquise ‘Hollywood’ Brown. If that’s even remotely accurate, look out Big 12 defenses.
• Speaking of recruiting, 2021 four-star DE Nathan Rawlins-Kibonge out of Portland, Ore. will be announcing his verbal commitment today around 5 p.m. CT. At 6’7” and 240 pounds, NRK has huge upside, both literally and figuratively. Keep your eyes on this one, Sooner fans, because landing this recruit would be a major win for Alex Grinch and the future of Oklahoma’s defensive line.

• The OU men’s basketball team is set to host UTSA inside the Lloyd Noble Center on Sunday, Nov. 15. The Roadrunners are led by coach Steve Henson, a former Sooners assistant under Lon Kruger.

• The Oklahoman’s Berry Tramel recently opined on the updated president/AD/coach triplets of Joseph Harroz, Joe Castiglione and Lincoln Riley. In the past, strong leadership at those key positions has helped OU remain one of the top havens for athletic achievements, and time will tell how fruitful this latest edition will be.
• In case you missed it, make sure to check out the first edition of the C&C Machine Recruiting Podcast with Kamiar Mehrabian and co-host Stephen Brown. In this episode, the guys discuss news surrounding a few Sooner DL targets, fallout from the situation in Stillwater and a whole lot more.

Around the Sports World

• Tom Brady may not be suiting up for the New England Patriots any longer, but even in a Tampa Bay Buccaneers uniform, he still suits up pretty nice.

• After a turbulent couple of days in Stillwater, the dust appears to have settled (for now) in regards to Mike Gundy and his Oklahoma State Cowboys football program. ESPN’s Harry Lyles Jr. took a step back from the microscope that RB Chuba Hubbard brought to light to assess the ever-evolving state of OSU and college football as a whole moving forward in 2020.
• Due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, Ohio governor Mike DeWine says fan attendance for the Hall of Fame Game between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys on Aug. 6 will be unlikely. If that’s the case, it will be the public’s first look at a major televised football game sans fans.
• The UNLV Rebels’ ‘Hey Reb!’ statue has been removed from the campus in light of its controversial history based on the 19th century Confederacy in America. Reportedly, both school officials and the donor for the iconic statue reached this agreement and thought it best to take it down. The changing of the school’s mascot itself is also in discussion.

• The NBA released a comprehensive document detailing how it intends to manage coronavirus testing for its players and coaches. Among the conditions is a plan of action and timetable for how the league will handle quarantining and treating those who test positive while in Orlando.
• 14-year-old super fan Mo Gaba is a three-time cancer survivor, and recently he was treated to a middle school graduation celebration parade courtesy of the NFL’s Baltimore Ravens and MLB’s Baltimore Orioles. Many of his supporters also swung by to share their congratulatory messages and words of encouragement. Beautiful stuff.

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