AllSooners Brent Venables Wrap
AllSooners publisher John Hoover, deputy editor Ryan Chapman and staff writer Randall Sweet break down Oklahoma coach Brent Venables' weekly press conference and Tuesday night's player interviews.
Transcript
00:00 Hey, what's up everybody?
00:01 John Hoover, allsooners.com, along with Ryan Chapman,
00:04 Randall Sweet.
00:05 We're outside Gaylord College today doing the stand-up,
00:09 the post-Venable stand-up, outdoors
00:11 because the weather's so nice.
00:13 And frankly, I screwed up the audio earlier.
00:16 I will fully admit, this is better, though.
00:18 This is better because tonight, we
00:20 got to talk to players after practice.
00:22 I think we got to talk to five or six players total.
00:25 We got to talk to, jeez, Andrew Rehm, Jonah Laulu, holy cow.
00:29 Marcus Stripling, Rondell Bothroyd,
00:31 Keith Lawrence, Gentry Williams.
00:33 Gentry, I forgot about Gentry.
00:34 So I thought all those guys were really good.
00:36 Got questions off to most of them.
00:37 We'll try to analyze it in a succinct manner for you.
00:40 Ryan, let's start with what Brent Venables talked about today
00:43 with the Oklahoma running game and the running backs.
00:45 And what the heck?
00:47 Why are you using two guys one week,
00:49 and then they never see the field the next week?
00:51 And then the two guys that didn't play last week,
00:53 they get all the carries this week.
00:54 What's going on there?
00:55 Yeah, we'll actually start with, he
00:57 was asked a question about it, and then a follow-up question.
00:59 I think it was Ryan Abra of the Oklahoman.
01:01 And we'll start with the follow-ups.
01:02 I thought that was the goods.
01:03 Brent Venables basically asked, what happened last year?
01:06 I was like, oh, Eric Gray existed.
01:07 Brent Venables basically said, yeah, because he's separated.
01:10 And they're looking for somebody to separate themselves so far.
01:14 That hasn't happened.
01:15 So with no one separating themselves,
01:17 Brent Venables basically said, he's
01:18 going to continue to rely on DeMarco Murray, the running
01:21 backs coach, to evaluate what's going on in practice,
01:24 what's happening there.
01:25 And when you get back to Brent Venables' coach's show
01:27 on Monday night, he talked about that they were ramping up guys
01:30 coming off of injury.
01:31 He didn't say the names, but that's
01:33 Javonte Barnes and Gavin Sodchuck.
01:34 And it means that they can't give them
01:35 full reps in practice, things like that.
01:37 And so for now, it's going to be who performs in practice.
01:41 That's who you're going to see on a game day,
01:43 because Brent Venables said, it's
01:44 hard to play four running backs over the course of a game.
01:47 So I like it, hate it, Sooner fans.
01:49 I think you're going to keep seeing running back roulette,
01:51 based on what's happened Monday through Friday
01:53 on that practice field right behind us.
01:55 So one of the things that's going on with the running game
01:57 is they're not clearing space.
02:00 The running backs don't have a ton of space,
02:02 whether it's Tawi Walker, Javonte Barnes, whoever it is.
02:06 It's having a tough time finding enough creases to get in there.
02:10 I talked to Andrew Rehm about that tonight.
02:11 What has to go into that?
02:13 And he talked repeatedly about it's just
02:15 knowing who to go to, knowing where to step,
02:18 knowing where to put your hands, knowing who to block.
02:20 Who's your assignment?
02:22 Is it that linebacker, or is it this nose guard right here?
02:25 Is it a combo block where you reach both of them?
02:28 There's a lot that goes into it.
02:29 One thing he emphasized, though, it's not
02:31 that they're not being physical.
02:33 He feels like that they are being physical
02:35 at the point of attack, at the line of scrimmage.
02:37 That's something that he's pretty happy with,
02:40 and they're going to continue to refine it as the running
02:43 backs become identified.
02:44 I know Brent Venable said today at his press conference,
02:47 it's hard to play four guys as running backs.
02:50 That's why you have a 1,000-yard rusher and then
02:52 a bunch of guys, usually.
02:54 Randall, let's talk about the defense.
02:55 I wrote a story today about the defense and how this--
03:00 this defense has come so far, and yet Brent Venable
03:04 was consistent.
03:05 We got a long ways to go.
03:07 Yeah, I mean, on Saturday in the postgame,
03:08 he was asked if they were dominant,
03:10 and he said emphatically, no, that they are not dominant.
03:12 But I think Brent Venable did concede that they
03:16 have made improvements, but he said that really to see how
03:19 much they have improved, they'd have
03:20 to look at the whole body of work at the end of the season
03:23 rather than analyzing where they are right now.
03:25 And I think Jonah Laulu tonight kind of echoed that sentiment.
03:28 He said that he could feel--
03:29 he and the defensive line could feel a lot of the improvements
03:32 that the team has made, but that they still
03:34 know that they have a long ways to go
03:36 and that they're working towards that.
03:38 They're not getting complacent.
03:39 That was the word that Jonah Laulu used.
03:41 And I think that coming into the year,
03:44 we talked about how easy Oklahoma's schedule was.
03:46 So far, they haven't played any world beaters on offense.
03:49 And I don't think that defense will really
03:51 be tested until they play the Longhorns in a few weeks
03:55 in Dallas.
03:55 And then we'll know, I think, a little more
03:57 how real that defense is.
03:59 Yeah, Ryan, you talked to Key Lawrence tonight.
04:01 We both did.
04:02 And some things stood out to you about his interview tonight.
04:05 I was pretty-- I got about three or four questions out,
04:08 and he answered some of them.
04:10 He was excited about the answers.
04:11 A couple of times, he was like, yeah, I don't really--
04:14 I don't really want to talk about that.
04:16 He didn't want to talk about the depth.
04:17 I just don't think he really understood the question.
04:19 But something that Brent Venables
04:20 talked about earlier on Tuesday--
04:22 go watch that video at allstuniors.com--
04:24 about having fun and that if you're enjoying what you should
04:26 do and what you're doing, you should be able to have fun,
04:29 too.
04:29 And Key Lawrence was asked, are they able to have that fun?
04:32 He said, yeah, basically it's because in year two,
04:35 they know what they're doing in this defense.
04:37 You're not having to sit there in the back of your mind
04:38 and be like, what's my alignment?
04:39 What's going on here?
04:40 They're just able to play free and free flowing.
04:42 And I think, guys, that last year, we saw a team
04:44 play with two kind of pressures.
04:46 One, a pressure from the fan base of the fans
04:49 are saying Lincoln Ryan, Lincoln Ryan, this.
04:51 It doesn't matter.
04:51 We need to go out and prove that.
04:52 But also the pressure of learning a new system.
04:54 This year, they're playing with an edge of they
04:56 want to right the wrongs of last year,
04:58 but also offensively, defensively,
05:00 it's their second year in the systems.
05:01 They know it.
05:01 It's Key Lawrence's second year with the same head coach
05:03 through his entire football career,
05:05 playing free, playing fun.
05:06 That's especially with the secondary.
05:08 And those linebackers look like they've done through four games.
05:11 Check out the story I wrote this afternoon at allstuniors.com.
05:14 Mistackle numbers are way down.
05:16 I went all the way back to 2018, which
05:18 was Mike Stoops' final year, Ruffin McNeil's year, 2019,
05:22 Alex Grinch's first year.
05:24 The numbers of mistackles are down.
05:26 The third down percentage is down.
05:28 Everything is down.
05:30 I know they haven't played anybody yet.
05:31 I know they've got one of the softest schedules
05:34 in the country and, frankly, in school history.
05:36 It just is.
05:36 It is what it is.
05:37 But they're taking care of business.
05:39 Guys, last year, we would have seen a lot more mistackles
05:42 against Tulsa, against SMU, against Cincinnati.
05:45 We're not seeing those.
05:46 We're seeing those one-on-one tackles.
05:47 We're seeing gang tackles at the football.
05:49 That's progress for this defense.
05:51 Yeah, absolutely.
05:52 And I think that--
05:53 I think Brent Venables even kind of talked
05:55 about that they are getting a lot of hats to the ball.
05:57 You know, they're really rallying.
05:58 I think we've heard the term a lot of population
06:00 around the ball used by Ted Ruff earlier in the year.
06:02 And that's evident from week to week.
06:04 I think that in previous years, we
06:07 see some of these one-on-one plays in the open field
06:09 that result in mistackles that go for 70 yards instead of 7.
06:13 And that's now becoming less of a common occurrence, I mean.
06:18 And again, against Texas, if the Sooners
06:21 can kind of continue that performance where they're
06:25 making all the--
06:26 they're playing sound on defense.
06:27 They're making the plays that are there for them to make,
06:29 then I think that, again, that's when we really
06:31 know that they've turned the corner this season.
06:34 Allsooners.com is where you're going
06:35 to find comprehensive coverage all week,
06:37 including tomorrow, the Allsooners podcast.
06:40 Got some good news coming on that pretty soon.
06:42 Stick around.
06:43 Don't miss it.
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06:50 We got it all, guys.
06:50 Allsooners.com for Randall, for Ryan.
06:53 I'm John Hoover.