Oklahoma WR J.J. Hester Said There Will be 'Nostalgia' in Missouri Return

The Oklahoma pass catcher spent two years in Columbia, MO, before transferring to OU.

Oklahoma Sooners wide receiver J.J. Hester runs after a catch against Ole Miss. / Petre Thomas-Imagn Images

NORMAN — Saturday is going to feel a little different for J.J. Hester.

Oklahoma’s leading receiver is returning to the place he started his college football career. 

Hester started at Missouri after starring at Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa, where he spent the first two years of his career. 

He redshirted in 2020 before appearing in 13 games for the Tigers in 2021. Hester caught 12 passes for 225 yards and two scores in 2021 before opting to enter the transfer portal and return to his home state in 2022. 

Hester has known about the matchup with Missouri since the Southeastern Conference announced OU’s slate of opponents, but when the actual schedule came out, he reached out to some of his former teammates that he has stayed in touch with since transferring to Oklahoma. 

“First thing I said, ‘this going to be a night game.’ And it ended up being a night game,” Hester said after practice on Tuesday. “And I texted some of the guys over there and I was like, ‘I’ll see you (in) November.’ ... And that's how that started.”

Hester said he’d enjoy catching up with some old friends after the game, but that he’s trying to approach this week the same as any other. 

“I know I'm going back home to where I started off at,” he said. “I’ve gotten a lot of questions about it and stuff but I'm just going to treat it like any other game. Trying to do anything different is how you mess up the routine and things like that.”

This week, Hester will try to carry some momentum from OU’s 59-14 victory over Maine. 

He had a nice showing, including working with quarterback Jackson Arnold on a scramble drill for a 90-yard touchdown catch. 

That big play, as well as the success from the entire offense against the Black Bears, will give the offense confidence on the road against the Tigers.

“We came out and we executed on what we wanted to execute,” Hester said. “That was very good especially coming in with our mishaps and stuff. We just wanted to get the offense moving and that's what we did. We're just going to use that to keep us going.”

Hester won’t be the only player on Saturday with close ties to both programs. 

Missouri’s star wide receiver Luther Burden was initially an Oklahoma commit, and the Sooners were in a public recruiting battle for Tigers’ defensive lineman Williams Nwaneri. 

A pair of Missouri’s offensive pieces actually made it to campus in Norman in receiver Theo Wease and offensive lineman Cayden Green, further the mix between the two locker rooms.

"We haven't really talked too much about it,” OU linebacker Dasan McCullough said of reconnecting with old teammates. “… But we're gonna treat this like any other week. We're just excited to go out there and play."

Brent Venables said the matchup, between the battles on the recruiting trail and the actual contests inside the white lines, doesn’t feel “spicy” to him, but it still will be odd for a guy like Hester who will be returning to the stadium he once called home. 

“(It’s not weird) right now thinking about it,” Hester said. “But when you get there it probably will. It definitely will be some nostalgia for sure just going back to where I started at.”