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Team Page | 2003 Schedule | Roster | 2002 Player Stats | SI.com Team Preview The Sooners shoot for the Sugar Bowl with a quarterback on a mission and their familiar devastating defense By Lars Anderson
 With his 23rd birthday upon him, Jason White had no great expectations as he prepared for an off-season workout on June 19. He planned to participate in a seven-on-seven passing drill in the morning, lift weights later in the day, then enjoy dinner and a movie in the evening with his girlfriend at his off-campus apartment. But when White walked out of the blazing Oklahoma sunshine and into the locker room following practice that day, he got the birthday surprise of his life. Sooners quarterbacks coach Chuck Long pulled the senior aside and delivered the good news: For the first time in White's college career he would be named the team's starting quarterback before the beginning of fall practice.
"It was exciting to hear that because it's been such a long road for me," says White, who in the eyes of the Oklahoma coaches outplayed sophomores Brent Rawls and Paul Thompson to win the starting job. "It was special because of everything I've had to go through." The 6'2", 215-pound White suffered major knee injuries in his second start of each of the last two seasons, and both came on plays on which White was not even hit. Two years ago in a game against Nebraska, he tore his left anterior cruciate ligament while running in the open field, and last season he shredded his right ACL and medial collateral ligament against Alabama on a similar play. Now fully recovered, White is the key player in the Sooners' quest to win their second national title in four years. No other championship-caliber team in the nation has as big a question mark at quarterback as Oklahoma, but if White can stay healthy and play up to his considerable potential, the talent-rich Sooners will once again be a serious threat to win it all. "The way Jason has worked to get back has earned him a great deal of respect from the team," says fifth-year Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops. "We think he'll have a big season. It will help that our offensive line is far and away the best we've had since we've been here." Since the Alabama game White has spent restless nights pondering one question: Why me? One of the most coveted quarterbacks in the country in 1998 while playing at Tuttle (Okla.) High, he had never suffered a major injury before he tore up his knees with the Sooners. "I've finally quit trying to figure out why this happened," says White, who in four starts for Oklahoma completed 94 of 149 passes (63.1%) for 871 yards and six touchdowns. "It was just two freak accidents." By White's own admission he's a different quarterback now than he was before the surgeries. He no longer has the quickness that made him a dangerous runner, but from his glass-half-full perspective he views that as a positive. "I used to have real fast feet, and I was always in a hurry -- in my drops, in my reads, everything," says White. "Now everything has slowed down for me. I'm more relaxed." It also has helped White's development that he faces a fast, physical defense every day. Oklahoma has nine starters returning on defense -- the most Stoops has had since he came to Norman -- from a unit that held its opponents to 15.4 points a game, tied for fifth best in the nation. The coach predicts that his defense will be even better this season, largely because of the marked improvement he has seen in the performance of standout defensive tackle Tommie Harris. Last year Harris (the cover boy of SI's 2002 college football preview) injured his groin during summer two-a-days. He wasn't completely healthy until after the Rose Bowl, and though he was named a first-team All-America, Harris ranked just 11th on the Sooners in tackles and was often a nonfactor during Oklahoma's stretch run. But Harris has put on 15 pounds since last January, and during spring practice he was virtually unblockable. "I don't see our defense having a weakness," says Harris. "I won't come out and say we're the best in the country, but we're right up there." White agrees. "We know our defense is going to be great," says the quarterback. "Now it's up to me and the rest of the offense to make sure we take care of business. I personally want to prove to the coaches that they made the right choice in making me the starter." More than anyone else, White knows that the best way to do that is to pilot the Sooners to the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 4. Issue date: August 11, 2003 |
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