DALLAS — DeMarco Murray says he doesn’t remember anything about his Red River Rivalry past. On Saturday, he played like it.
A senior playing for a fourth time against archrival Texas, Murray rushed for 115 yards and a pair of touchdowns on 25 carries and helped No. 8 Oklahoma hold off the No. 21 Longhorns, 28-20.
“I see what I see from DeMarco a lot, and that’s good, hard, physical running,” said Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops. “He pounded the ball today, ran physical, took care of it. I never saw the ball bobble. He caught the ball well. He did everything you want him to do.”
For Murray, it’s probably a good thing the past two games against Texas have been erased from his memory. The gap between them and his production on Saturday is extraordinary.
He literally woke up on Saturday morning with more rushing yards against the Longhorns than he had in 2009, thanks to a five-carry, minus-3 yard day in the Cotton Bowl a year ago.
His average — 4.6 yards — on each carry in Saturday’s win was more than his total rushing yardage from his past two years against the Longhorns, three yards.
Instead, he channeled the play of freshman year DeMarco Murray, who, like senior Murray, topped 120 yards on the day and reached the end zone.
“He needs some space at times, and when he [gets it], he makes something happen,” Stoops said.
He got that space on Saturday, and with the help of his five offensive linemen, a couple tight ends and true freshman fullback Trey Millard, he broke loose against The Artists Formerly Known as College Football’s Best Run Defense.
“They did a great job blocking all day,” Murray said. “We knew we had to run the ball to win this game.”
And with Oklahoma’s performance stretches a streak of 12 consecutive Red River Rivalry wins for the team that outrushes the other.
For the offensive line’s efforts, Stoops handed them the first game ball in the locker room, later saying that it was “probably” their best performance of the season.
“They did an excellent job of run blocking and overall protection. They were a big part of this game,” Stoops said.
The Longhorns were caught by the Sooners up-tempo offense early on, and 59 of Murray’s 115 yards came in the first half.
“Some of our guys were looking to our boundary when they should have been playing,” Texas coach Mack Brown said.
He was happier with the defense’s effort in keeping up with the pace in the second half, but Murray still pounded them for 56 more yards on 11 carries after halftime.
And after breaking an 18-yard touchdown to finish Oklahoma’s first drive of the game, he put the Sooners up 28-10 with an encore early in the fourth quarter. He slipped into the second level of the defense before tiptoeing Oklahoma’s sideline and diving over the pylon, flipping over his head and landing on his back for a 20-yard touchdown run.
After the game, linebacker Travis Lewis — complete with a Superman “S” shaved in the side of his mohawk — snatched the Golden Hat Trophy and showed it off to anyone who wanted to see it. A junior, he hadn’t felt what Murray felt as a freshman: Happy on the 190-mile, three-hour bus ride home to Norman.
“I’ve always wanted to do that,” Lewis said. “This has been a long time coming and I’ve been on the losing end of this for two years, so there’s a lot of built-up frustration coming out running around the field. I’m going to enjoy every minute of this.”
Without Murray’s efforts, Lewis and the rest of his teammates would be hoping to forget what happened on Saturday.
Follow