Bison ‘hungry’ after pandemic wiped out ’20
SHAWNEE — Oklahoma Baptist’s football momentum finally was stopped. It took a pandemic.
OBU joined the Great American Conference for the 2015 season, and the Bison went 2-9 each of their first three years in the NCAA Division II conference made up of Oklahoma and Arkansas schools.
But OBU climbed to 5-6 in 2018, then 7-4 in 2019. Covid wiped out the GAC’s 2020 season, but 2021 kicks off next week, and OBU is picked fourth in the 12-team league.
Our series on state-college football teams continues today with Oklahoma Baptist.
“Yeah, we’re definitely hungry,” said OBU coach Chris Jensen. “It’s been a long time since we’ve been on the sideline.”
The Bison don’t go gentle into the season. They open on Sept. 2 with a road game at Great American favorite Ouachita Baptist.
But OBU goes to Arkadelphia, Arkansas, with a known commodity in quarterback Preston Haire.
The 2019 Bison led the league in scoring and total offense. Hair threw for a Great American-high 3,041 passing yards and 26 touchdown passes.
“It’s invaluable to have somebody like him that has been there, done that,” Jensen said. “He just goes about his business the right way. He’s really consistent. He’s a rock every day in practice and off the field with the younger players.
“He is a strong competitor. And he wants to win. So he prepares to win. He works his tail off.”
Haire has help. OBU wasn’t hurt much by attrition, despite the lost season. Jensen said the Bison lost a few players who decided to get on with their lives, but several other graduates decided to stick around and play.
“I think we’ve got a lot of pieces to the puzzle,” Jensen said. “Lot more than we’ve ever had. Lot of older players that have been there, done that.”
Josh Cornell is an all-GAC wide receiver who placed second in the league in 2019 with 1,054 receiving yards and 10 touchdowns.
Defensively, linebacker Josh Arnold is one of those graduate players. And free safety Felipe Alvear was voted, by his teammates, the player who best represents OBU’s core values. He’s thus eligible to wear No. 0, which will be legal this season in Division II.