Skipping rivalry game between Sooners, Huskers an easy call
Bob Stoops had a choice.
The Oklahoma football coaching legend could check out the Sooners renewing a dormant rivalry that spans 87 games and dates back to 1912.
Or he could watch Kentucky host an FCS team.
It was an easy call. Stoops will be in Lexington, Kentucky, this weekend.
“Shows you how important it is,” he told The Courier Journal on Wednesday. “I’m missing OU-Nebraska to come see Mark.”
Stoops was referring to his younger brother, Mark Stoops, the newlycrowned king of football wins at Kentucky after breaking Paul “Bear” Bryant’s school record with his 61st victory last Saturday at Florida.
And Mark’s Wildcats aren’t hosting just any FCS program. They’re welcoming Youngstown State, the Stoops brothers’ hometown school.
With another brother, Mike Stoops — a former assistant to Bob at Oklahoma — now on the Kentucky staff, it’s a chance for a reunion of family and friends. And it’s an opportunity to salute the youngest of the six Stoops siblings a week after his record-breaking win.
Though Mark Stoops is in his 10th season at Kentucky, Bob has seen him coach relatively little. Bob Stoops coached Oklahoma for the first four seasons of his brother’s UK tenure, and though he has visited Lexington, it’s been a while.
“It’s always fun to be around family and friends, but (mostly) just to see Mark work, and Mike,” Stoops said. “To see them work. To see their team up close and personal. I haven’t seen the new (practice) facility and what they’re working with. It’ll just be great to see all of that.”
Stoops said he’ll arrive in Lexington on Thursday and stay with Mark through the weekend. They’ll have lunch Friday — Bob said he hopes to “not sample very much” Kentucky bourbon in the middle of a weekday, “but have a little bit.”
There’s plenty reason this weekend to toast his brother.
Though Mark Stoops has downplayed the significance of breaking Bryant’s record, shying away from the inherent comparisons to a football legend best known for his success at Alabama, Bob Stoops wants to give his brother his due.
“Mark’s very humble, but you have to acknowledge what he’s done,” Stoops said. “It shows two things — just his ability as a coach and a leader and Kentucky’s ability to win and win in a big way. And I truly believe there’s more to come, that the championships will come.”