Bob Stoops reveals hilarious tidbit surrounding Antonio Perkins legendary Sooners moment
Antonio Perkins had one of the most legendary games in the history of Oklahoma football. It was 2003, and Perkins had been the Sooners’ punt returner since the previous season. For his part, Bob Stoops was in his fifth season at Oklahoma and had already won a national championship.
It was the team’s fourth game of another promising season and Oklahoma welcomed UCLA to Norman. Over the course of that game, Antonio Perkins would score three different touchdowns on punt returns.
““I had Bob Stoops get on me several times because I wouldn’t fair catch,” Antonio Perkins told The Athletic. “I would take hits. To me, that was my only time to get the ball.”
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When you score a touchdown almost every time you return the ball, a coach like Bob Stoops isn’t going to complain too much. On September 20, 2022, the 19th anniversary of Perkins’ explosive game, Stoops took to Twitter to add some hilarious context to his accomplishment.
“Believe the last one we were in punt safe-no return,” Bob Stoops said in a quote tweet of the punt returns.
In layman’s terms, the punt block coverage was designed to avoid a return. He was supposed to fair catch the ball, but scored anyway.
Antonio Perkins provided three touchdowns in a win for Oklahoma. In the end, the Sooners won 59-24. Without those returns, the game wouldn’t have been a blowout. Unfortunately, the season ended in disappointment. Oklahoma took a perfect record into the Big 12 Championship Game, where they fell to Kansas State. They followed that loss up with a Sugar Bowl loss to LSU.
“Bottom line, as long as he could catch it — and he was very good at catching it — this is a guy who could get by people with his first few steps,” Bob Stoops told The Athletic.