Oklahoma football: Sooners’ offensive supremacy approaching supernatural

Two years ago, the Oklahoma football offense led the nation, averaging 580 yards per game. Last season, the Sooners again fielded the country’s most prolific offense, averaging 570 yards per contest.

This season the, OU offensive machine is has hit a new gear and is averaging a staggering 688 yards of total offense through four games, 100 more than the next closest challenger.

The scary thing, if you’re a Big 12 defensive coordinator, is that the OU coaches and players are convinced that they haven’t played their best yet on offense. There are things we still need to do better, head coach Lincoln Riley says, recognizing that the Big 12 defenses they face are going to get stronger in the weeks ahead.

Coming into the 2019 season, there were concerns among some college football experts that while the OU defense was determined to get better, the offense might take a step backward from the high plateau it has been operating from the last three or four seasons. That was based on the notion that the Sooners would be introducing a new starting quarterback for the third time in as many seasons and, if it was Alabama transfer Jalen Hurts, as expected, his passing accuracy was considered the weakest part of his game.

At Big 12 media days in July, Riley was quick to dismiss the idea that the high-octane Oklahoma offense might digress some in 2019. “We don’t plan on the offense dipping,” he said at that time.

And he was right. The Sooners’ have started off in record-setting fashion. as OU If anything, this may be the best offensive unit of the Lincoln Riley era. And that’s saying something.

Oklahoma has exceeded 600 yards of offense in all four games this season, and is likely to do so again this weekend, when the Sooners take on the Kansas Jayhawks, who are allowing over 400 yards a game against teams that are not nearly as explosive as OU.

Two years ago, with Baker Mayfield at the quarterback spot, Oklahoma averaged and NCAA-best 8.3 yards per offensive play. The previous school record up to that point had been 7.1 yards per play, set back in 1971. Last season, with dual-threat Kyler Murray operating behind center, the Sooners set a new NCAA record, averaging 8.6 yards per play.

That brings us to this season – the year some thought would represent a decline offensively for the Sooners. Through four games, Hurts and the offense are blowing away the record book, averaging 10.4 yards, or essentially a first down every play. To put that into further perspective, that is over two yards per play more than the next closest team, which happens to be No. 1 Alabama, averaging 8.3 yards per play this season.

“We’re expected to go out and execute every time we’re on the field.” — OU redshirt sophomore fullback Jeremiah Hall

Another thing that makes the Oklahoma offense so dangerous and difficult to defend is how balanced it is. The Sooners have offensive weapons all over the field. They can beat you running the ball, and if you load the box to stop the run, they turn loose their deep roster of receiving playmakers who spread the field and possess breakaway speed.

It’s pick your poison if you’re on defense against the Sooners. OU is averaging 375 passing yards per game and 294 rushing yards, both 4th among FBS teams, an 55 points a game, No. 2 nationally.

“There’s no limit,” OU quarterback Hurts said after the win over Texas Tech about directing the Oklahoma offense. “There’s always more. Enough ain’t enough.”

In four games this season, Oklahoma has had 49 offensive possessions and scored on 33 of them. 29 of which were touchdowns. That’s a success rate of 67 percent.

As the two Sooner quarterbacks before him, Hurts has been the primary catalyst of the Oklahoma offense, and he’s playing like someone who is carrying a big chip on his shoulder, or what teammate Jeremiah Hall prefers to describe as a boulder.

Hurts has been where the Sooners want to go — having played in three consecutive national championship games for Alabama — and his Oklahoma teammates are quickly realizing that he may be just the answer they need to get them over the hump and back to the national title game with a legitimate shot at college football’s holy grail.

Hurts presently leads the Sooners in rushing with 443 rushing yards and a 9.4 average per carry. He also has completed 78 percent of his pass attempts for 1,295 yards, with one interception in 85 attempts, and accounted for a combined 17 of OU’s 29 touchdowns (12 passing and five rushing).

Hall and his OU teammates on offense are not that concerned with the huge numbers the Sooners are putting up. They know that if everyone does his job, the numbers will come, along with the wins.

“We’re expected to go out and execute every time we’re on the field,” Hall was quoted in an article that appeared on the OU athletic website. “And if we’re doing that every time we’re out there, that probably leads to something big.”

Oklahoma is clearly doing a lot right on offense, but Riley continues to emphasize that they have to continue to keep getting better. “There (has been) more good than bad, but we just have to keep growing,” the Sooner head coach says.

*Statistical information contained in this article was sourced, in part, from the Game Notes provided by the OU athletic department.