NORMAN, Okla. — I stood within the bowels of Dolphin Stadium as a distraught Nic Harris bawled on a golf cart simply exterior the locker room. Just moments earlier, with time winding down, a backpedaling Tim Tebow had motioned his arms collectively at Harris with the Gator Chomp, as he and Florida dashed the elite defensive again and Oklahoma’s probabilities at an eighth nationwide championship.
The Sooners had performed in 4 of the earlier 9 nationwide championships, banking only one victory there. Little did we all know that can be the final time it will occur for fairly a while.
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The following fall, the Sooners returned a bulk of guys from that 2008 squad that misplaced solely a pair of video games, that one to Florida and an epic Red River Showdown towards arch rival Texas. That included offensive stars Sam Bradford, Jermaine Gresham, Ryan Broyles and Trent Williams, and defensive stars Frank Alexander, Jeremy Beal, Keenan Clayton and Travis Lewis, amongst others.
One not returning was, of course, Harris. So, it’s comprehensible that after posting a game-high 11 tackles, with an interception within the BCS National Championship at Miami Gardens, Harris would have been as down within the dumps as he was.
But maybe the others, although down within the dumps at the current second, had a distinct perspective. They returned as members for the preseason No. 3 staff within the nation, one that at least a couple of specialists believed would climb over the mountain they couldn’t attain the apex of the autumn and winter earlier than.
Then got here the preseason. Gresham injured his knee, and was in the end misplaced for the season following surgical procedure. Linebacker Mike Balogun was dominated ineligible. His backup, Tom Wort, suffered a season-ending knee damage like Gresham. Centers Ben Habern and Brian Lepak each obtained injured, forcing Brody Eldridge to step in there. And then there was the massive one. Bradford, the reigning Heisman Trophy winner, suffered an AC joint sprain in a 14-13 opening loss to BYU, later re-injuring it towards Texas after his return and lacking the rest of the yr.
In the meantime, the losses stacked up for Oklahoma. Before the 16-13 setback by which Bradford went down for good, it endured one other one-point loss, 21-20 to Miami, and afterwards it added 10-3 and 41-13 selections to the ‘L’ column at Nebraska and Texas Tech. The latter blowout, throughout which the Sooners donned all-white Nike Pro Combat alternates, served because the rock bottom second.
It additionally made for the one different time this century Oklahoma entered Bedlam with 5 losses. Oklahoma would reply with two straight victories, together with a 27-0 shutout over Oklahoma State and a 31-27 ‘W’ within the Sun Bowl over Andrew Luck’s Stanford squad, with Tavita Pritchard filling in for the ailed star sign caller.
“They were bought in 100%,” recalled Brent Venables, then the defensive coordinator. “And this can be a group of guys that had been very profitable all yr actually. And so that says loads about who they’re and the idea in each other and what we’re asking them to do, even when issues possibly on the surface aren’t going [well]. Everybody else was depressing. But our guys by no means, once more, quote-unquote, they by no means flinched.
“So, and I know there’s some similarities even to the 2005 group that we’ve alluded to, and I’ve got some guys on staff that were part of that that have been able to, to me—I feel like, this is just me, I feel we’ve been able to stay connected through all the chaos of this season. And I’m proud of that.”
So a lot is completely different now than then, nonetheless. In the only of phrases, that was a completely loaded roster. This yr’s model is, regardless of if individuals need to name it excuses or what have you ever, a depleted one.
Now, that’s not to say there’s not expertise sprinkled round. There are upper-star gamers, your so-called blue-chippers; there are NFL gamers and the like. But there are a lot fewer of them in contrast to again then. The present local weather is a component of that.
“Again, okay, we’re having a 5-5 [season],” Venables mentioned. “So, it’s been how many ever years? It’s been a long time since Oklahoma has been 5-5. I’ve never been 5-5. But it’s also I think you have to be real and practical. And I think this is the biggest roster turnover that’s ever happened here. Right? I think that’s fair to say. So, that’s never happened until now, too. So, I think a lot goes into it.”
He’s proper, on a number of accounts. Oklahoma hasn’t been 5-5 because the conclusion of Howard Schnellenberger’s lone yr in 1995—it was worse than 5-5 within the three ensuing seasons. Venables has by no means been a component of a 5-5 staff. That ’09 squad was 6-5 coming into Bedlam. The different poor season he referenced in ’05, Oklahoma was 6-4 additionally following a loss in Lubbock and prior to profitable its remaining two. And the Sooners misplaced a lot off a 2021 staff that largely lucked its manner to an 11-2 end. I gained’t undergo all of the names, however you recognize loads of them: Caleb Williams, Mario Williams, Nik Bonitto, Perrion Winfrey, and so on., and so on.
The harsh actuality after stating this can be a quantity of issues:
- We overinflated this staff’s ceiling.
- A winding path led to this level. AND
- This was crucial.
People gained’t need to hear No. 3, so we’ll get to that after a bit. First, let’s tackle Nos. 1 and a couple of.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to level out the primary of these. I’m not a rocket scientist—removed from it—however I’m sensible sufficient to make the commentary that expectations had been, unjustifiably, via the roof following a 3-0 begin. The Sooners waxed UTEP, Kent State after which former-longtime rival Nebraska to run out to that begin. They averaged 42.3 factors per sport throughout that opening stretch whereas holding opponents to 10.3 factors per contest.
That had nationwide speaking heads like USC-fan boy Colin Cowherd leaping aboard the Sooner Schooner.
“Oklahoma is the second-best team I’ve seen this season,” Cowherd mentioned following that 49-14 bloodbath in Lincoln.
The Schooner, like through the 2019 season after a rating towards West Virginia, crashed from there. Kansas State, in 41-34 trend, defeated Oklahoma for the third time in 4 years the very subsequent week. Blowout losses to TCU and Texas, solely the third shutout at the palms of its arch rival within the latter, in addition to a 38-35 setback to Baylor and final weekend’s 23-20 embarrassment at West Virginia adopted.
Talk on Sept. 17 a few College Football Playoff caliber staff has shifted precisely two months later to one that could not make a bowl sport. (That’s not my prediction, simply the reality). Did I point out we overinflated this staff’s best-case situation and misplaced observe of actuality?
Second, there aren’t any scarcity of issues that have introduced this system to this level, in my estimation. Let’s doc a couple of of these.
Back prior to the 2020 season, I wrote a prolonged piece about Oklahoma’s longest-ever drought between nationwide titles. It was 20 at the time, and it’ll be 23 seasons because it hoisted the trophy when the Crimson and Cream open up the 2023 marketing campaign. That piece, which yow will discover here in its entirety, had a pair key parts that precisely depict the falloff particularly between that final look within the National Championship Game in 2008-09 and at present.
One of these was a dramatic drop-off in recruiting. A pair time frames will be remoted to reveal this. The final class Venables was a full half of earlier than departing for Clemson ranked because the No. 13 class nationally. Over the following 5 seasons from 2012-16, half of the time Venables directed the Tigers’ protection, Oklahoma’s common nationwide rating dropped to 15.2, with a low rank of No. 19 in 2016. But let’s dive into it additional. After signing 10 five-star defensive commits through the 2000s, Oklahoma inked solely two over the following decade, Caleb Kelly and Brandon Williams, who performed working again earlier than finally transferring. Gerald McCoy, signed with Venables on employees, proved to be the lone first-round NFL Draft decide through the 2010s. Not till Kenneth Murray went No. 23 total in 2020 did the Sooners lastly snap that nine-year streak.
Now, to be completely clear, another superb gamers like Alexander, Bonitto, Neville Gallimore and Ogbonnia Okoronkwo have superior to the NFL ranks for profitable careers. But by and enormous, there’s been a drastic change programmatically, and notably on the defensive aspect of the soccer.
That brings me to my subsequent point of interest. There’s been this shift away from stressing dominant protection on campus. It runs hand-in-hand with an unbelievable model of offensive play emphasised by the earlier regime. In different phrases, Lincoln Riley and his employees put collectively such an explosive offense with such gaudy numbers as evidenced by producing back-to-back Heisman winners, with one other finalist, all of the whereas largely neglecting their protection.
One will say Riley’s firing of Mike Stoops following a 48-45 loss at the Cotton Bowl through the 2018 season is a powerful argument towards this sentiment. He did in the end care. I, nonetheless, supply a differing opinion on that entire topic. His new rent, Alex Grinch, by no means solved the equation, and a handicap was all the time there to ease the ache for ‘Speed D’s’ woeful play.
That handicap: NFL stage quarterbacking. In a pair of circumstances, NFL No. 1 draft decide stage quarterbacking. The likes of Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray and Jalen Hurts and Williams as nicely, together with a plethora of NFL talent gamers, masked so many defensive points and allowed the Oklahoma program to conceal behind a veil for a quantity of years.
Not anymore. It’s not as if Dillon Gabriel has been horrible. After all, he’s thrown for greater than 2,200 yards and 16 touchdowns to solely 4 interceptions, finishing 63.9% of his passes. And working again Eric Gray has ripped off a salty 1,113 yards and 10 touchdowns on 165 rushes. But the precision simply hasn’t been there throughout the board offensively, even with a handful of 40-plus-point outings.
Meanwhile, the protection, as Venables wades via the primary yr of set up in his tried and true system, has proven many of the problems we’ve seen over latest years. Lack of leverage. Poor positioning. Numerous missed tackles. Bust, bust, bust.
You see, these aren’t Venables-defense-exclusive points. These aren’t solely to place on Ted Roof, both. These are a mixture of accepted cultural mishaps that have been permitted as a result of of the quantity of Big 12 Championships and College Football Playoff berths achieved through the superior stage of offense Oklahoma has displayed over its opposition lately. It’s been ignored, that is to say. And not solely has the offense not been ready to paved the way to one other Big 12 Title and CFP berth in 2022, however the lack of complementary soccer, each bit as a lot to blame on the offense because the protection, has led to this present 5-5 mark.
So, let’s transfer onto bullet level No. 3. This fall from mediocrity was crucial. I name it mediocrity as a result of 20-plus years with no nationwide championship for one of the nation’s best-ever packages and a blue blood is precisely labeled that. And frankly, subpar play on one aspect of the ball makes that greater than a good classification, regardless of some of the intense {hardware} that’s come the Sooners’ manner alongside the way in which.
Let’s see it via extra of a lens of realism as opposed to some of the rosy narrative many had been fed. The Sooners participated in, as talked about, 4 CFPs.
In the primary of these in 2015, towards Venables and Dabo Swinney’s Clemson Tigers within the Orange Bowl, the Sooners narrowly led at halftime earlier than they had been clearly overmatched in a 37-17 defeat. Two years later, they dueled Georgia blow-for-blow in a single of probably the most historic Rose Bowls of all-time, finally falling 54-48 in time beyond regulation. A yr after that, earlier than the informal fan might blink, Alabama had raced out to a 28-0 lead towards them in a sport that was hardly as shut because the 45-34 remaining on South Beach indicated. The final of these appearances featured probably the most lopsided of all, a 63-28 blasting at the palms of Joe Burrow and the LSU Tigers within the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl. Break all of it down, and the Sooners had been actually aggressive in solely six of 16 quarters on the massive stage, arguably much less.
And sensing a theme from that set of scores? With Bob Stoops at the helm within the first and Riley there for the opposite three of them, the Sooners allowed 1 / 4 of a degree lower than a half-hundred per sport towards the quartet of true nationwide championship contenders—49.75 factors per sport.
The “we’re close” narrative that frequently turned a factor and, to this date, irritates Sooner Nation was a farce. Oklahoma wasn’t shut. Rather, it was in want of an overhaul. A serious one.
That’s the place, need to hear it or not, Venables’ strip it down to the studs line earlier this season was useless on correct. And have in mind his first utilization of that phrase got here after a 45-13 season-opening win over UTEP.
“On Monday we’re going to strip this factor again down to the studs and begin over once more,” Venables mentioned at the time. “And that’s what the nice packages can do, participant pushed, coach pushed, all people having a way of urgency and desperation about beginning over. No matter what occurred, regardless of the way you play, you bought to begin fully over all the way in which down to the muse and do it once more this week…You’ve obtained to be dedicated to a course of in the way you play and compete at a very excessive stage. And it’s a really arduous factor to do. Winning is tough sufficient. Winning constantly is even tougher. So, the inform of that tape can be informed over the course of time.
“But I love the leadership on this team, and the buy-in and the commitment has been there. They’ve done everything we’ve asked. So, I’m not doubting them now, but the test of time is going to tell.”
Perhaps all of us ought to have caught on to some foreshadowing. The overhaul was going to have its fair proportion of tough moments, the bottom of these final week’s loss in Morgantown at the ultimate whistle.
Sure, for a lot of of these studying this, there’s most likely a large bit of skepticism. I don’t blame you for being unconvinced within the course of proper now both. Many of you lived the 90’s, the final time any of us even a lot as questioned if Oklahoma would nonetheless be taking part in in December. The Sooners, by the way in which, have completed that 23 straight seasons.
But this wasn’t ever going to be simple. Just because the sustainability Bob Stoops constructed for his program within the 2000s on the way in which to 4 BCS Title Game appearances in 9 seasons was something however simple.
Sure, there can be defections. It stays to be seen precisely who all that can be, as Venables continues to put his plan in place. There can be additions that match his tradition higher. It stays to be seen precisely who all that can be.
In the meantime, there can be continued doubt from a spread of sources. The identical ones who had been lauding Venables’ 3-0 Sooners because the second-best staff within the nation earlier than they performed a reliable opponent can be talking loudly about him not being the precise man.
Yet, even with that, for that second to come as soon as once more the place a brand new Nic Harris can dangle his head in disappointment after a slim miss at an precise probability at No. 8, a lot change needed to occur each stylistically and culturally. That’s an ongoing course of, and one no one will be affected person sufficient for.
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