On a post-Thanksgiving Saturday in 1999, Josh Heupel — the JUCO transfer that mad scientist Mike Leach had found on a Utah mountain somewhere — was quarterbacking the unranked 6-4 Sooners in his first Bedlam experience.

It was early in the game and the Sooners had a third down and long.

Across the way, on Owen Field’s east sideline, Oklahoma State’s scatological defensive coordinator Rob Ryan screwed up his face and started screaming: “F**k you, Hype. You’re a P***y! You’re a bitch!”

Ryan’s screams caught Heupel’s eye as he began barking signals from his shotgun position. He turned and faced Ryan, pointed ahead toward the Cowboy end zone and mouthed the words, “Watch this.”

You know what happened next, of course. A Heupel big-play pass to wide receiver Curtis Fagan — one of many that obliterated Ryan’s Poke-y defense in the Sooners’ 44-7 win. The win put an end to OSU’s previous two-game series win streak which contributed to ending John Blake’s head coaching career and led to Bob Stoops’ hiring and, well, you know the rest.

More importantly, that moment, which I witnessed firsthand in my role as a sideline photographer standing near Ryan that day, said all you need to know about the competitiveness of the man coaching the Tennessee Volunteers on that same field this Saturday night. Only this time it will be Heupel on the visitor’s sideline wearing the orange.

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