Oklahoma vs. TCU 2012: Defense shines in Sooners victory

The Oklahoma Sooners finished off the regular season with a hard-fought 24-17 win over the host TCU Horned Frogs on Saturday, capturing a share of the Big 12 title in the process and likely securing a BCS bowl berth with the victory. The win was in jeopardy until Oklahoma's defense forced an incompletion on TCU's fourth-down pass to the goal line in the final minute.

The Oklahoma defense was the story of the game on Saturday. The gang over at SB Nation's Oklahoma blog Crimson & Cream Machine with more on the defensive effort:

While we could easily sit around and play, "what if" with this week's defensive performance, the bottom line is that they came up on the positive side of the biggest play of the game, when Jefferson broke up that pass. That play capped off an overall defensive performance that held TCU to just 12 first downs for the game and forced 8 punts. More than than, Oklahoma's defense was huge on third downs. The Horned Frogs converted on just three of fifteen third downs and only had a total of 62 plays for the game.

It wasn't a perfect performance for Oklahoma's defense but it certainly was effective.

The Sooners lost only two games this year, to Kansas State and now-No. 1 Notre Dame. The victory over the Horned Frogs puts Oklahoma in position for a BCS at-large berth, but that depends on where MAC champion Northern Illinois ends up ranked in the final BCS rankings. A top-16 slot for Northern Illinois would mean Oklahoma gets bumped from a BCS bowl game.