The blowing winds and frosty air of night football in December at Arrowhead Stadium gives the Big 12 Championship Game something it has never had. The previous four championships have been played in domed stadiums where everyone was treated to great games and comfortable surroundings. This year, get ready for some real football, the old fashioned way, with the elements playing as big a role as the teams.

Forget that for the past five or six years the average temperature in Kansas City has been in the 50's. Once the Chiefs used that argument with the NFL and got the Pro Bowl in Kansas City. When the teams arrived to start practice, it was so cold the NFL had to fly everyone to San Diego for the week. Sure enough, on game day the temperature was close to 50 degrees. Needless to say, the game never came back to KC.

This game promises to have more drama than any of the first four games because these teams have played earlier, and undefeated Oklahoma is the No. 1 team in the country. But the real excitement will come from OU's close call last Saturday night in Stillwater and the appearance of an offense losing it's steam. This is no time to slow down; the Wildcats have been laying in wait for this rematch. K-State has been studying every play from the first game and watched closely as Texas Tech and Oklahoma State played the Sooners too close for comfort. Can Bill Snyder spring the upset on Oklahoma and send the BCS into a tumble?

No. 1 Oklahoma

Game Plan: Oklahoma

Offense: Get Heupel off to good start -- score first possession. Move receivers and give some new looks. Use bootleg plays for running and passing. Defense: Smother the run game -- do not let it get started. Full blitz on Beasley with overloads on one side. Disguise coverage with new looks this time. Kicking: Use two men back on punt return vs. windy night. Adjust returns for cold and wind. J.T. Thatcher must get to directional kicks. Players: This is your game -- go out and take it from the start. Maintain confidence if game is close in second half. Enthusiasm, enthusiasm, enthusiasm. Coaches: Expect a better prepared KSU team -- they will adjust. No panic on the sidelines regardless of situation. Make sure you can score with drive in 4th quarter.

Immediately after the Oklahoma State game on Saturday night, Bob Stoops told a television audience the Sooners would be ready to play this week. Translation: maybe we did not play our best today, but you will see the best we've got in the championship game; don't worry about our offense being stalled. Granted, OSU had far more to win than lose against their old rivals, but the haunting question is whether the OU offensive coaches have run out of creative ideas.

Is this as far as Josh Heupel can take them? Have the opponents figured out how to play them after watching Nebraska and Texas try to blitz and give up big plays? Will teams now just sit back and wait to see if Heupel can make all the throws to keep the chains moving and score enough points to win? Add the swirling winds of Arrowhead, and nothing about offensive perfection can be taken for granted.

No team like Oklahoma has come as far as fast. The Sooners were only an afterthought for the Big 12 South division, but with great play from Heupel and an offensive line that picks up blitzes with regularity, they have dominated their opponents. Last year the running game was spotty; this year it has been a wonderful complement against teams dropping seven and eight defenders to play against the pass.

Heupel can move around, giving pass rushers no set place to find him, and he's made some great throws while avoiding tacklers. Sometimes he simply throws into traffic and gets away with it, but lately the radar guns have shot him down with interceptions.

The toughest assignment a defensive coordinator has against the Sooners is to decide what to stop first. With Antwone Savage, Curtis Fagan, Quentin Griffin, Andre Woolfolk and Josh Norman all having 30-plus receptions this year, the defenses get spread thin enough for someone to always get single coverage. Heupel reads the secondary on the pre-snap and knows exactly where he wants to go with the football.

The beauty of this set of receivers is that every one of them runs hard all the time; they know the ball will be coming to them in the right circumstances. Overlooked by some is the importance of Griffin, who has 38 receptions, many on the little shovel type pass.

Griffin and Renaldo Works are the ball carriers in this offense, and they bring toughness with enough speed to break big plays if given the opportunity. Griffin is the go-to guy near the goal line; he is short and goes right under many tacklers. Look for the draws, traps and little counter plays to keep the KSU defense honest. If the weather gets real nasty, this part of the attack will need to control the ball.

Bob Stoops, Mike Stoops, Brent Venables and company are comparable to the military leadership of General Norman Schwartzkopf during the Gulf War. They have great strategy, firepower and the nerve to face the enemy at all times. This is the unit that took Texas' Roy Williams out of his game and throttled Eric Crouch's running of the Husker option except for one long run. There is speed and experience at all positions with the linebackers considered the best in the defensively-strong Big 12 conference.

J.T. Thatcher is an outstanding return man who has taken two back for touchdowns as well as an interception. In all, four different defensive players have scored touchdowns on interception returns.

No. 7 Kansas State

Game Plan: Kansas State

Offense: There is an advantage in the run game -- make use of it. Use some new play action passes from best runs. Angle block with offensive line to create best run lanes. Defense: Load up at line of scrimmage -- but back off late. Zone blitz to reduce offensive line from doubling in pass protection?defensive line must win one on one battles to get to QB. Keep safety down middle -- over play Heupel's left side. Kicking: Use threat of returns to rush the punter; crisscross rushers. No mistakes handling the ball on cold, windy night. Set tempo of game from first kick off. Players: Believe, believe, believe. Play with a chip on your shoulder -- prove your worth. Ignore momentum changes -- just play hard for 60 minutes. Coaches: Give team confidence by showing what you have changed -- share new game plan with them. Decide what to take away from OU offense in 1st quarter -- have something new for second half. Play for the wind late in the game.

Bill Snyder knows how the other side is feeling this week; it was just two years ago when Texas A&M upset his Wildcat team in the championship game and cost them the possibility of playing for a national crown. Having lost the first match up against OU is a decided advantage for KSU. They know what did not work and will change accordingly; they have to admit their mistakes. OU won handily the first time and may just try to duplicate the game, which will be a tragic mistake if they try it. Look for several changes from both sides of the ball, although it will not be wholesale. Snyder knows his formula for success and will stick with it.

Jonathan Beasley is the key figure on offense, as he goes so will the Wildcats. Beasley has been so erratic at times coaches and players are left to wonder how he got so far off track. The one thing Beasley can do in this game to give his team a good chance for victory is throw a high completion percentage in his passing. At 50 percent for the season, there is too much to overcome with incomplete balls. Anything close to 60 percent will be tremendous; that means finding some secondary receivers and getting them the ball, and it means hitting some short throws when presented. Josh Scobey is trustworthy with the ball in his hands, he should get it often in an attempt to soften the OU defensive front seven.

Kansas State does not have the depth at wide receiver like Oklahoma, but they have two great weapons in Quincy Morgan and Aaron Lockett. These are two big time players who can and will make the plays if the ball is near them. Oklahoma must throttle them to stop the offense.

"Learn from history or you are doomed to repeat it."
That will be the epitaph on the tombstone if the KSU defense tries to play OU as they did the first time. No team has successfully blitzed Josh Heupel without getting burned by big plays. Kansas State is not as physical this year as the past three years, but they have quickness. If all seven up front play gang busters against the run and pressure Heupel without the blitz, they will have success. An occasional blitz is good, but the Wildcats cannot live by coming all the time; no one has.

The limited role of David Allen might be the entire story for KSU this year. Without his heroics on returns, the special teams have not been the same. Even with Aaron Lockett's two punt returns for touchdowns already noted, it must be frustrating for the team not to see Allen back there. What a lift it would be if he were back there on the first punt return opportunity. How about the pressure on the coverage unit if both Allen and Lockett were in the game to handle short or directional kicks?