16th Annual
Sugar Bowl
January 2, 1950
#2 Oklahoma 35 (Final: 11-0-0)
#9 LSU 0 (Final: 8-3-0)
Tulane Stadium
Att: 82,000
Official Game Stats – PDF
Official Sugar Bowl Rosters – PDF
Official Sugar Bowl Game Program – PDF
Oklahoma Sets Sugar Bowl Scoring Record and Rolls to 21st Straight Win
Oklahoma fullback Leon Heath (center) presented the Sugar Bowl MVP trophy by Herbert Benson (left) and Frank Schaub (right).
How Oklahoma and LSU Met in the 1950 Sugar Bowl
A powerhouse Oklahoma team, led by head coach Bud Wilkinson, came into the 1950 Sugar Bowl with a 20-game winning streak and the nation’s top rushing offense (320.3 yards per game). Meanwhile, the Sooners’ opponent LSU was just 8-2 and needed a rule change to be bowl-eligible due to having less than a .750 winning percentage in league play.
LSU wasn’t a pushover however as the Tigers had knocked off three conference champions – Rice (Southwest), North Carolina (ACC), and Tulane (SEC).
“We actually started off well,” Tiger back Kenny Konz said later. “We started like we had been playing during the regular season, pretty efficiently. Things at that point were going well.”
Things didn’t start the way they finished. Not by a longshot.
For 15 minutes the LSU line actually outperformed Bud Wilkerson’s alternating units. In two possessions, the Tigers reached the Sooners 15, then the 35. But they failed to put points on the board.
Sooners quarterback Darrell Royal had to change things up to cope with the LSU defense. “Our drop-back passes were completely useless because they knew exactly what was coming,” Royal said. “The passes I did complete were a new set of plays that we didn’t practice.”
Nine plays into the second quarter, Royal went to his alternate plan, lateralling to halfback Lindell Pearson, who threw to a wide-open Bobby Goad 40 yards downfield on the 8. But LSU’s strong showing continued, as the Tigers held the Sooners on fourth down inside the 1.
Everything changed in the second quarter. George Thomas scored on a 27-yard pass from Pearson following a short drive after an LSU punt. And then the Tigers lost a fumble and Thomas scored again on a 5-yard run.
In the third quarter, Konz seemingly gave LSU a chance to get back in it with a booming punt that came to rest at the OU 14. However, fullback Leon Heath wheeled out of the Sooner split-T and blazed 86 yards, the longest scoring run of all the previous Sugar Bowls, to effectively end the game.
Armand Kitto, a 157-pound LSU end who chased Heath the length of the field, said, “They say on a long run like that, a bear will jump on the runner’s back. Well, I just kept waiting for the bear to jump on him and, instead, he jumped on me.”
Another lost fumble and interception near the LSU goal led to Royal scoring on a five-yard run and Heath adding a second touchdown on a 34-yard dash to make the score 35-0. The two long running scores made Heath a no-brainer for Most Outstanding Player honors.
In the first 15 games the Sugar Bowl had a remarkable matchmaking record with an average of seven points separating the opponents. The 1950 game remains the worst scoring differential in Sugar Bowl history. The headline in the Dallas News of January 3 read: “Oklahoma Overpowers Minor League LSU Team,” ignoring the fact that LSU had beaten both Rice and North Carolina, the Cotton Bowl participants.
Wilkerson graciously understated the SEC’s eighth defeat in 12 Sugar Bowls when he said, “If we played LSU a dozen times, we’d never play that well against them again, or score that many points. They’re too good a team.”
This was probably why the Sooners coach didn’t take out his regulars until approximately three minutes remained in the game and the score stood at its final 35-0.
Recap excerpted from the book “Sugar Bowl Classic: A History” by Marty Mulé, who covered the game and the organization for decades for the New Orleans Times-Picayune.
Miller Award Winner Leon Heath.
Sugar Bowl Game Program, January 2, 1950.
1950
Tulane Stadium
Att: 82,000
Oklahoma 0 14 7 14 – 35
LSU 0 0 0 0 – 0
SCORING SUMMARY
OU: Thomas 27-yard pass from Pearson (Tipps kick)
OU: Thomas 5-yard run (Tipps kick)
OU: Heath 86-yard run (Tipps kick)
OU: Royal 5-yard run (Tipps kick)
OU: Heath 34-yard run (Tipps kick)
| Oklahoma |
Team Stats |
LSU |
| 10 |
First Downs |
8 |
| 286 |
Rushing Yards |
38 |
| 2-11-2 |
Passing |
9-20-4 |
| 74 |
Passing Yards |
121 |
| 360 |
Total Yards |
159 |
| 7-37.4 |
Punting |
8-33.6 |
| 4-4 |
Fumbles-Lost |
4-4 |
| 8-40 |
Penalties-Yds |
6-40 |
Rushing
OU: Heath 15-170, 2 TDs
LSU: West 5-28
Passing
OU: Pearson 2-7-0, 74 yards, 1 TD
LSU: Pevy 5-11-0, 82 yards
Receiving
OU: Goad 1-40
LSU: Baggert 4-50
Miller Award recipient: Leon Heath, Oklahoma fullback
