Oklahoma Football: Sooners’ 2016 Strength No Longer Sore Subject for 2017
By Chip Rouse
Great college teams lose great players every year. That is the inescapable nature of the sport. And Oklahoma football, the nation’s No. 3 offense in 2016, has some huge holes to fill on that side of the ball in the coming season.
It would be ludicrous to think that there won’t be some negative impact from the loss of three huge contributors to OU’s success on offense last season. By the same token, though, it also creates the opportunity for the next wave of Sooner stars to emerge and make their presence known.
That is precisely what head coach Bob Stoops, his coaches and the Sooner fans are banking on as Oklahoma diligently works through its spring practice schedule in early preparation for the next college football season.
Two positions around which there are few if any concerns looking ahead to the fall of 2017 are quarterback, where two-year starter Baker Mayfield will be back at his command post, and the offensive line, perhaps the most underrated yet highly integral pieces of a well-oiled offense.
All of the Sooner starters on the O-line are back in 2017, and a couple of those veterans are being pressed hard by their backups.
That should be a big relief any glass-half-empty types in the Sooner Nation who are questioning OU’s ability to run the ball as effectively as the past two seasons without the tag-team tandem of Samaje Perine and Joe Mixon operating in the Sooner backfield and terrorizing opposing defenses. As anyone who knows anything about football is painfully aware, even the best of quarterbacks and running backs will struggle mightily behind a bad or inexperienced offensive line.
The same could also be said, however, about the chances for success by a marginal backfield performer even behind the best of big boys up front.
Let’s get this on the table right now. There is nothing marginal about the talent or ability of the two primary running backs that are likely to be one and two on the Sooner football depth chart come this fall.
Redshirt sophomore Rodney Anderson has been at Oklahoma for two seasons, but has played in just two games and carried the ball just once for five yards. That is not a reflection of his talent level or potential, but rather the harsh reality that the game is highly physical and injuries are part of it.
A consensus four-star recruit, Anderson was highly recruited not only by the Sooners, who signed him as a member of their 2014 class, but also Alabama, Auburn, LSU and Texas A&M out of the SEC and Texas and Baylor of the Big 12.
Unfortunately for the young running back out of Katy, Texas, he sustained a season-ending leg injury in the Tennessee game in 2015, and he injured his neck in the preseason la year ago and was forced to miss the entire season.
Anderson has impressed the Oklahoma coaches after one week of spring practice, but the Sooners are taking no unnecessary chances and have him wearing a no-contact jersey this spring.
Fortunately for the 6-foot, 3-inch, 223-pound Anderson, and fortuitously for OU, he is healthy again and back this season and he is not stuck behind the best running-back combination in college football having to compete for limited playing time.
Sophomore Abdul Adams spent the 2017 season as the third man up in the Sooner running back rotation behind Perine and Mixon. He rushed for 283 yards, averaging 5.3 yards per carry, and caught three passes out of the backfield. Adams, who has excellent speed, ran for 91 yards against Kansas last season and had 54 rushing yards in a game with Iowa State in which he started, filling in for the injured Perine and Mixon, who was suspended for that game.
The Sooners also have beefed up at the running back position with several highly touted additions in its 2017 recruiting class, the most promising being junior-college transfer Marcelias Sutton, the No. 2 JUCO prospect as the position. Sutton was recruited as an athlete and possesses similar skills and all-purpose versatility exhibited by Mixon.
As for receiving targets for Mayfield in Lincoln Riley’s Air Raid offense, which will not have Dede Westbrook burning defensive secondaries going forward. Expect to see the Sooners utilize junior Mark Andrews more this season. Andrews is a big body with ample speed, who played much of last season injured.
Expect also to hear the names of Jeffery Mead, Nick Basquine, who caught 30 passes and five touchdowns between them in 2016, called more often next fall.
Oklahoma supplemented its receiving corps with the recent addition of Jeff Badet, a graduate transfer who was the leading receiver for Kentucky in the 2016 season.
Offensively, with the parts they have in place and the influx of talented newcomers, there shouldn’t be much of a drop off in 2017, and – hold on to your hats – there is a decent chance it could be even better. Just sayin’.
Next: Sooners Will Have to Win on Road to Three-Peat in Big 12
What about the OU defense next season? What improvements can we expect to see on that side of the ball?
Now that is subject that is very much up for debate, and the real issue, if you ask me, whether the Sooners will be a contender or pretender in 2017 for the College Football Playoff.