COACHING HISTORY
7
JIM TATUM 1946
In his only year as OU coach, Jim Tatum devised a massive recruiting effort that took the Sooners to prominence. His venture in the first year after World War II had never happened before or since because NCAA rules would not permit it and no school could afford it. The process almost bankrupted OU. Tatum had tryouts, winter practices, spring practices and summer practices. The few rules the NCAA had in those days were largely ignored by Tatum. In pursuit of building a national powerhouse, he snared many discharged servicemen who had played at other colleges before the war. Tatum also raided rival campuses, recruited a conventional number of high school seniors and ran off most of the 1945 players. Estimates on the number of players who tried out ran as high as 600. Oklahoma’s 1946 recruiting class produced nine All-Americans. In the 1945 coaching search, Oklahoma opted to hire Tatum over Paul "Bear" Bryant. A 32-year-old North Carolina native, Tatum had served with Jap Haskell, OU athletic director, in the Navy. Tatum was head coach one year at North Carolina before the war and led a Navy team at Jacksonville. He also was line coach at Iowa Pre-Flight under Missouri’s Don Faurot, inventor of the Split-T offense. Some of the regents were more impressed with Charles (Bud) Wilkinson, Tatum’s friend who accompanied him on the interview, than Tatum. After the Sooner victory over North Carolina State in the Gator Bowl, Maryland contacted Tatum and offered a coaching position. OU President Dr. George Cross privately hoped Tatum would leave so he could elevate Wilkinson. Tatum had become "very difficult to work with," said Cross. Tatum had also spent the athletic department’s entire surplus of $125,000 before the first game and run up a deficit of $113,000. Tatum did accept the contract with Maryland. From there, he accepted the head coaching position at the University of North Carolina. Tatum died suddenly in 1958 of a mysterious viral infection despite appearing to be in excellent health.
COMPOSITE RECORD
Alma Mater Coached North Carolina 1 yr.
YEAR-BY-YEAR RECORD Year 1946
W 8
8
BENNIE OWEN 1905-1926
L 3
W 8
T 0
Pct. .727
L 3
T 0
OU Pts. Opp. Pts. 309 120
Pct. .727
OU Pts. 309
OU Avg. 28.0
Opp. Pts. 120
Opp. Avg. 10.9
Captains Jim Tyree, Oklahoma City, Okla.
At 17, Oklahoma’s sixth football coach made part of the famous Cherokee Strip run from the south Kansas border into Oklahoma Indian territory, making him a true Boomer Sooner. His age prevented acquisition of any land, but his sense of adventure took him four miles into the territory before turning back, making him a true Okie. Bennie Owen coached Oklahoma for 22 seasons, longer than anyone else in school history. He began a tradition and a stadium that have endured for almost a century. Before coming to the university, Owen played and coached under Fielding Yost at Kansas and Michigan, and helped develop Yost’s feared hurry-up offense. In it, Owen, the quarterback, would yell out signals for the next play on the bottom of the pile up of the preceding play. Although Owen only weighed 126 pounds, he was respected by all as a fierce competitor. Before coming to OU in 1905, Owen coached and taught chemistry at Bethany, Kan., an early football power. Four of Owen’s Oklahoma teams—1911, 1915, 1918 and 1920—were undefeated. Owen’s first football star at OU was Owen Acton in 1907, a halfback, who the university recognizes as its first all-conference player. Despite this, the 1907 season was misfortunate for both Owen and Oklahoma athletics. Owen lost his arm in an October hunting accident which left him out of coaching for the remainder of the season, and the athletic director, Vernon Parrington, was discharged by the new governor, Charles Haskell, along with all other Republicans at the university. It was not until 1911 that Owen and his players began to get national attention. In 1913, OU’s Claude Reeds was recognized as an All-American. About this time, Owen began to seriously play around with the forward pass, which had been introduced on a highly restricted basis in 1907, to open up the game. Reeds was the first to make good use of the pass, but another Sooner All-American, Forest "Spot" Geyer, built a legend with it. At the end of the 1920 season, Owen announced that he intended to raise $340,000 to build a 30,000-seat stadium, with an eventual expansion to 52,000 seats, and a 5,000-seat gymnasium. By 1928, Owen’s vision resulted in Memorial Stadium circling Owen Field, as well as the OU Field House. Owen coached six more years after 1920 before becoming solely athletic director. In 1950, Owen was one of 21 coaches to be elected to football’s first National Hall of Fame.
COMPOSITE RECORD Alma Mater Kansas
Coached 22 yrs.
YEAR-BY-YEAR RECORD Year 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926
W 7 5 4 8 6 4 8 5 6 9 10 6 6 6 5 6 5 2 3 2 4 5
L 2 2 4 1 4 2 0 4 2 1 0 5 4 0 2 0 3 3 5 5 3 2
W 122 T Pct. 0 .777 2 .667 0 .500 1 .850 0 .600 1 .643 0 1.000 0 .555 0 .750 1 .864 0 1.000 0 .545 1 .591 0 1.000 3 .650 1 .929 0 .625 3 .438 0 .375 1 .313 1 .563 1 .688
L 54
T 16
OU Pts. Opp. Pts. 229 55 124 36 181 75 272 35 202 110 163 31 282 15 197 80 323 44 440 96 370 54 472 115 451 103 278 7 275 63 176 51 127 102 64 114 144 111 28 80 93 44 137 52
Pct. .693
OU Pts. 5132
OU Avg. 26.5
Opp.Pts. 1426
Opp.Avg. 7.3
Captains Byron McCreary, Norman, Okla. James Monnett, Yale, Okla. Bill Cross, Kingfisher, Okla. Key Wolf, Davis, Okla. Charlie Armstrong, Kingfisher, Okla. Cleve Thompson, Erick, Okla. Fred Capshaw, Norman, Okla. Glenn Clark, Comanche, Okla. Hubert Ambrister, Norman, Okla. Billy Clark, Comanche, Okla. Forest Geyer, Norman, Okla. Homer Montgomery, Muskogee, Okla. Frank McCain, Ada, Okla. Hugh McDermott, Duncan, Okla. Erl Deacon, Tecumseh, Okla. Dewey Luster, Chickasha, Okla. Lawrence Haskell, Anadarko, Okla. Howard Marsh, Madill, Okla. Pete Hammert, Anadarko, Okla. Obie Bristow, Ardmore, Okla. Eddie Brockman, Tulsa, Okla. Pollack Wallace, Oklahoma City, Okla.
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