Sooners need to play ‘lights out’ against TCU and head to Red River battle with confidence
It was foolish of us to think that Brent Venables could take the reins of Oklahoma football and immediately contend for national titles.
While there is a lot of talent to work with, the culture change that needs to take place will not be instantaneous. Especially on the defensive side of the ball.
He who shall not be named left the defense in shambles basically through in-difference. He thought he could just out score everyone. And his defensive coordinator could have made the “All-Just-Standing-There-Team”.
All this was painfully obvious while watching a mediocre K-State team with a mediocre quarterback in Adrian Martinez run all over the Sooner defense to the tune of 41 points and over 500 yards of offense.
Kansas State won’t do better than an 8-4 record this year. Unfortunately Oklahoma might not either.
It will take some time to shake off the apathy of the previous administration
Quite a few of us were lulled into a false sense of security after the first three games, watching the defense annihilate inferior opponents. Kansas St. was a much better test for both sides of the ball, and the Sooners failed.
The Oklahoma offense played well enough to win, although Gabriel missed on some passes that he should have made and could have helped win the game.
With the defense struggling, the offense needed to play better than “well enough to win”. And 11 penalties didn’t help either.
We like to say that Oklahoma is the kind of program that doesn’t rebuild, it reloads.
But when you are changing coaches, you are changing philosophies and culture. It will take some time to shake off the apathy of the previous administration.
The bad habits, the softness and maybe even laziness of years pass. Once again, especially on the defensive side of the ball.
Oklahoma will try to get the bad taste of that loss out of their mouths when they travel to Ft. Worth and take on the TCU Horned Frogs this Saturday morning. TCU is 3-0 this season, but has yet to play anyone of any substance under first year head coach Sonny Dykes.
Dykes was plucked from SMU last year after long time TCU head coach Gary Patterson was pushed out after starting the 2021 season 3-5. Dykes is a disciple of the Hal Mumme/Mike Leach air raid offense, and they have been scoring points. But again, it has been against bad teams.
And the Sooners might see a familiar face under center for the Horned Frogs. Former OU quarterback Chandler Morris had won the starting job over senior Max Duggan before getting hurt in the first game of the season. Morris has been cleared to come back, but Dykes is playing it close to the vest in saying that Duggan will start but both QB’s might see action.
Which is smart to make sure Oklahoma has to game plan for both players.
Any road game in the Big 12 is not going to be easy. Even Kansas is no longer a gimme.
The Sooners will need to play lights out to come away from Ft. Worth with a win and go into the Red River battle with confidence.
So it is not surprising that the Worry Meter is high at 85% this week.
In Bob Stoops first year as head coach, Oklahoma lost 5 games. But then he won a National Title the very next season. Patience is a virtue. But it is in short supply around here.
With all that being said…BOOMER!!!
–Dave
WORRY METER: 85%
Follow
