No. 4 Oklahoma was No. 3 last week and dropped in the polls because they didn’t beat Kansas bad enough on Saturday in Lawrence.

OU (8-0, 5-0 Big 12) beat KU 35-23. The Jayhawks had a strategy of slowing the game down and it worked in the first half as Kansas took a 10-0 lead into halftime. But OU rebounded in the second half, outscoring KU 35-13 and securing the victory.

OU has won 16 games in a row – the longest winning streak in the nation and the longest since winning 20 in a row in the 2000 and 2001 seasons. This is OU’s first 8-0 start since 2004.

Yet the polls penalized OU by jumping Alabama, which has one loss, into the No. 3 spot. And keeping Cincinnati, which struggled to defeat Navy (1-6) 27-20, at No. 2.

All season, teams have tried to defeat OU by conducting long drives with short gains and using as much time as possible between plays. As a result, OU hasn’t scored as many points but they keep winning.

“I’m proud of our guys and the way the first half especially went,” Kansas coach Lance Leipold said. “When you design things and want it to go a certain way, we did a great job of managing the clock. We were able to mix some things together and keep their explosive offense off the field.”

OU coach Lincoln Riley won’t apologize for winning.

“Obviously, (I’m) proud of the win and our fight in the second half,” said Riley. “Not excited about how we played in the first half. Just really poor football in the first half all the way around. Penalties especially, showed up a lot of long drives. We couldn’t get Kansas off the field and a lot of that because of penalties. Several missed opportunities offensively …

“And so we had to bow up the second half and then we did that. We played better on all three sides in the second half. I give our team credit for rising up. I don’t care who you’re playing, if you don’t seize momentum early, in a road football game, you’re gonna be in for a dogfight and we were.”

OU is on target to win another Big 12 Championship as the only undefeated team left in the league. The three closest teams – Oklahoma State, Iowa State and Baylor – all have a league loss. And OU still has to play all three of those teams with Iowa State at home and Baylor and Oklahoma State on the road.

“I loved the way we finish and, if we’ll ever figure out how to play a complete game, with the way this team can finish, we can have something,” OU coach Lincoln Riley said. “It’s going to be on us and how bad do we want to become that complete team. The way we finish is elite but we’re just going to have to bring the rest of it around pretty quick.”

OU will host Texas Tech (5-2, 2-3 Big 12) at 2:30 p.m. Saturday on ABC and the next weekend OU draws a bye.

In a surprise move, Tech fired coach Matt Wells in his third season. Offensive coordinator Sonny Cumbie will coach the rest of the season for the Red Raiders.

Kansas (1-6, 0-4) is in the Big 12 cellar and played their best game of the year against OU. The Jayhawks beat South Dakota and then lost six straight games by margins of 27 points, 38 points, 19 points, 52 points, 27 points and 12 points (against OU).

“Kansas deserves a lot of credit,” Riley said. “ They made some really nice plays. I thought they were very efficient offensively …and had a good plan …

“… We had a good visit in there right after the game. I think our guys know what we need to do, but it’s time for us to start closing the gaps and playing a little bit better here, more consistently. That is what it is. I think we’re still a very capable football team, there’s no question. We’ll be excited to have a chance to get some of the guys back … It’s is a combination of getting some of these guys back, obviously we’re pretty thin in a lot of areas, we’re going to get guys back.”

Freshman quarterback Caleb Williams had a mediocre first half but he threw two touchdown passes and rushed for another against Kansas. Williams completed 15 of 20 passes (75%) for 178 yards (with his first career interception) and rushed eight times for 70 yards and a score.

“He didn’t play very good in the first half,” Riley said of Williams. “I thought more than anything, there was probably a little bit of frustration…. We had low possessions, we weren’t playing well. Especially the interception (where we have two) backs standing wide open in the flat. And so he’s got to be a little bit more composed, but he handled the second half well. I think he understood what we were doing. Obviously he made some important plays. I thought he was pretty calm in the second half and certainly more settled.”

Running back Kennedy Brooks rushed for 79 yards and two touchdowns on 24 carries.  It was his third straight game with at least 20 carries. He has rushed for 449 yards in that span (average of 149.7 yards per game).

“The guys that are playing have got to play at a high level, we’ve got to coach at a high level,” Riley said. “Our times when we’re not playing well, it’s close, but we’re tired of being close. We gotta push it over the edge. We’re getting there. Back half the season. This time we got to do it. So, again, proud of the win, don’t take them for granted, know we have to get a lot better.”

Riley said he hasn’t seen a dropoff in game preparations.

“I think we practice good,” Riley said.

“I wouldn’t characterize our practices as alarming but I wouldn’t characterize them as unbelievable either. And that’s what we need. When I told the guys we need to walking off the practice field saying ‘dang, that was an unbelievable practice.’ We’re having to pull those guys off and I don’t want to say I haven’t seen that. I haven’t seen them terrible, I’ve seen a practice terrible here and it wasn’t that either …. I think the intent early was fine.”