John Walters

The Big 12’s primary color is a primary color.

Lincoln boasts the Red Sea, Nebraska’s faithful flock who were doing monochrome stadium fashion long before the “-out” era.

Lubbock has the Red Raiders, Texas Tech’s mascot name.

And Saturday in Dallas, a metropolis in a decidedly red state, will welcome the Big 12’s biggest rivalry, the Red River Rivalry. Top-ranked Oklahoma (5-0) meets No. 5 Texas in what is definitely the conference’s, if not the country’s, Game of the Year … until, depending on the winner, next week (more on that later).

“It’s two Top 5 teams that are playing really well,” said Texas coach Mack Red—um, Brown—after the Longhorns (5-0) cruised past Colorado, 38-14. “We’ll have everybody in America talking about the game next week, and that’s what we want.”

Of course, no object is more closely associated with the color red than blood. And that, figuratively, is what the Sooners and Longhorns are out for each October when they meet. Blood. What would any Western epic be without it?

The Big 12 is neither short on color — reds, Brown — nor colorfully nicknamed rivalries: the Battle of the Brazos (Baylor-Texas A&M) and the Border War (Kansas-Missouri) come to mind. And while each of those is older, extending across three centuries, no rivalry in this conference, if in any conference, showcases more talent, tradition, and pageantry (pipe down, Ann Arbor and Columbus).

If OU-Texas (or, to be non-partisan, Texas-OU) is not the essence of college football, we don’t know what is. Each year since 1929 the Longhorns and Sooners have met at the Cotton Bowl (the series began in 1900) during the State Fair of Texas. Here are two schools, located approximately 375 miles apart, meeting midway just yards from the Midway.

Atmosphere? As the Texas Star, the largest ferris wheel in North America (70.6 yards high) spins in the background, fans of both schools bisect the Cotton Bowl’s 79,000 seats into two sections, burnt orange and crimson, that meet at the 50-yard line. Bevo, the Longhorn mascot whose signature horns are so menacing that he was kicked out of last year’s Holiday Bowl, owns one corner. The Sooner Schooner, a pony-pulled covered wagon that was flagged for unsportsman-like conduct in the 1985 Orange Bowl (the less said the better, except to note that wagon wheels are susceptible to muddy turf), patrols another.

Little of which would matter if so much were not at stake. And this season is no different.

Four of the last eight Red River games featured a team that would later appear in that season’s BCS national championship game. In 2000, 2003 and 2004, Oklahoma played for the national title, beating Florida State in the ’01 Orange Bowl. In 2005 Texas, behind quarterback Vince Young, beat USC in one of the most memorable championship games ever, the ’06 Rose Bowl.

Saturday’s winner could well produce the fifth BCS championship contender of the past nine years. Only twice in the past 40 years has neither team been ranked in the AP poll. Saturday’s game will mark the fourth time in the past eight games that both OU and Texas have been ranked in the Top 5 when they met.

More on Red River Rivalry Oklahoma vs. Texas at Dallas, Noon ET Sat., ABC In-depth video analysis, breakdown Trash Talk: All eyes on Red River Rivalry, again Opinion: ’Horns headline this week's hot seat McCoy, Bradford become friends despite rivalry Vote: No. 1?  |  Top rivalry? |  Team of Decade? Heisman Hopefuls: McCoy very much in the mix Quarterback slideshows: McCoy  |  Bradford 2008: Longhorns rally to surprise Sooners

And while Big Ten cynics may note that the Sooners and Longhorns are never as battle-tested after five games as the Buckeyes and Wolverines are after 10 — or 11 — it remains a remarkable testament to their dominance.

Saturday’s meeting, the 103rd (Texas leads 57-40-5, though OU has won six of the last eight), will be focused around a pair of gunslingers with gunslinger names: Sam and Colt.

Sam is Oklahoma red-shirt sophomore quarterback Sam Bradford, the most potent force of nature Oklahoma skies have seen since the twister. Last year the Oklahoma City native set an NCAA record for touchdown passes by a freshman (36) and led the nation in passing efficiency (175.6 rating). Through five games this season Bradford is second in the nation in passing efficiency to Tulsa’s David Johnson, albeit with a higher rating (205.4) while already halfway to last season’s TD pass mark, with 18. He has thrown just three picks in 146 attempts.

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