✌🏽 Happy Wednesday, friends. Let’s ride.

🐯 About those LSU rumors

Oklahoma’s head ‘ball coach, Lincoln Riley, has been linked to the open LSU job, according to *checks notes* the gut-feelings of talk radio hosts and random dudes that know how to use flight-tracking websites.

Riley didn’t say “no” when asked how he’s handling reports that he’s bolting for Baton Rouge, but he dismissed the idea that he would consider it.

“It’s nothing to handle,” Riley said in response to The Oklahoman’s and friend of the newsletter Ryan Aber’s question. “I mean, it’s pretty easy. I coach [OU]. And you guys know me. You know how I feel about this place and this program. So, we’ve all been down this road many times before. You guys know where I stand on that, and that hasn’t changed.”

Rumors that swirl like this come with the territory of Riley’s position. His predecessor, Robert Anthony Stoops, dealt with it his entire career in Norman.

Could Riley leave? 100%.

But right now, there is no credible information on the Internet that should you give you any indication Riley is taking the LSU gig. I promise the investigative team at Eyes on Oklahoma is working diligently to comb through Riley’s following list and likes on Twitter every hour.

More notes from Riley’s Tuesday news conference:

• Biggest swing in Baylor game: Looking at OU’s drive chart against Baylor, it’s not hard to see where OU really fumbled an opportunity to take control of Saturday’s game.

  OU squandered three scoring drives on an interception and two missed field goals in the first half. Caleb Williams then a threw interception on OU's first possession of the second half.

  Not ideal.

  “I thought honestly the biggest swing in the game the other day … I didn’t really realize it as much in the sequencing after the game,” Riley said, “but after the first I think two drives, we had a good drive, we go down and miss a field goal. I think we go down and score [a touchdown on the next drive]. We go down and miss another field goal. And then the drive right after half we clip off two or three plays just rolling and then have just the needless interception. And so, we had four drives in a row where we’re rolling pretty good, and we got seven points out of it.”

  OU’s defense at least held strong during that stretch. But OU’s inability to get the offense and defense going at the same time has been an issue, which Riley also noted on Tuesday.

• Wins masking issues?: It’s well noted that it’s typically taken a drastic loss for Oklahoma to make big changes.

  Well, the Sooners have an L now and Riley was given the opportunity to tackle whether or not winning has disguised some of OU’s flaws.

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  “Maybe to the outside. I mean, I don’t know. I’ve sat up here every week and answered questions about our flaws while we won all nine of those. So, in our world it’s different. Behind those walls we address every single flaw, whether we win 76-0 or we lose a close game like we did the other day.

• Update on Williams: Riley said quarterback Caleb Williams, who had his hand stepped on by a cleat during Saturday’s game, will start against Iowa State and has been “full-go” this week.

  Not sure if anyone was concerned about it, but I’m not going to complain when Riley offers up a straightforward answer about his depth chart.

  Oh, and if anyone else wondered, yes, that cleat to the hand did affect Williams’ performance, according to Riley.

  “I think he was frustrated he’d made a few mistakes, that we weren’t playing well,” Riley said. “He was frustrated physically with not being able to grip the ball and throw the ball the way that he typically does after getting his hand stepped on.”

  Williams’ final stat line against the Bears: 9-of-18 passing, 142 yards passing, two interceptions, 17 yards rushing, 10 carries, one rushing touchdown

• An odd senior day: OU’s senior day will be a bit strange with all of the eligibility questions, stemming from COVID.

  Riley did a decent job of explaining but perhaps it might be worthwhile to see who does participate in the festivities.

  “We’re going to let any of our guys that are seniors on the field. We’re going to give them the option to participate in senior day,” Riley said. “I wouldn’t read too much into that because we’ve told guys … obviously a lot of these guys are going to have decisions to make and obviously all of our super seniors will participate. But the guys that do have that COVID year exemption remaining, some will participate, some will not. Those that have not necessarily made a decision. We’re just going to kind of leave it up to their choice, and then we’ll get to those decisions with them and their families once the season ends.”

📉 New Playoff rankings

Oklahoma dropped from No. 8 to No. 13 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings.

⏰ On this day

Nine years ago today, Oklahoma won a 50-49 thriller over West Virginia in Morgantown, W.V. The highlights are wild.