Brent Venables pumped about 2023 season and so are Sooner players
By Chip Rouse
Brent Venables is as well aware as anybody that the college football world will be closely watching to see how his Oklahoma team responds in 2023 to the major disappointment of the Sooners’ 2022 season.
A 6-7 season is not nearly good enough at Oklahoma, a team that has the most wins in college football since the end of World War II.
Venables told media representatives at Big 12 Media Days this week in Arlington, Texas, that he and his assistant coaches started “peeling back the onion” in January to identify the areas in which they needed to improve. It was pretty much everywhere, Venables acknowledged.
“Last year doesn’t mean anything to what happens this year,” he said. “That’s literally how you coach, how you prepare.” You learn from your failures, Venables said. You make necessary adjustments and plans to counteract and change the outcomes when faced with similar situations in the future.
The Sooner head coach noted that in five of the Sooners’ seven losses last season, it came down to the final one or two minutes of the game, and Oklahoma still had a chance to win.
Venables is excited about the year-over-year improvement he is seeing in his team and believes the Sooners are better prepared, deeper at most positions and better conditioned to flip the script and turn those close losses into wins in 2023.
The difference between winning and losing can be very close. Sometimes you’re on the right side of it, sometimes not. Oklahoma has been fortunate to be on the right side of winning and losing many more times than not. Venables used as a contrasting example of the 2000 OU national championship team to make his point.
“In 2000, we won the national championship (at Oklahoma), and we had a handful of games come down to the last drive of the game,” he said.
Nothing ever stays the same, the OU head coach said. You will always have roster turnover. Oklahoma’s 123-man 2023 roster, for example, includes 97 players in either their first or second season wearing a Sooner jersey.
Sooner players QB Dillon Gabriel, WR Drake Stoops and LB Danny Stutsman joined their head coach at Big 12 Media Days this week and talked about their shortcomings a year ago and what they are doing to get better both in their individual preparation and training and collectively as a team. Each seemed very optimistic for the coming season and what the Sooners can achieve.
“Heavy is the crown,” Venables said. “But I embrace that. When you’re not successful, it all rests right at your feet.”
This is a winning organization with a long track record of success and a very passionate fan base, the OU head coach said. “Winners respond (to adversity),” he said. Winners come back a better version of themselves…winners go right back at it, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do.
“What I want people to see when they see us play (in 2023) is a humble football team, a driven and hungry football team, a team that’s going to run the football and play great defense,” Venables said.
“My expectation is you’re going to see the thumbprint of those traits on this football team this year.”