Oklahoma football in process of assembling history’s best OU D-line class
By Chip Rouse
The next 48 hours for Oklahoma football fans will be some of the most nerve-wracking since the recruitment of Caleb Williams — you all remember him, right? — and even Adrian Peterson nearly two decades earlier.
On Monday, five-star defensive end prospect Williams Nwaneri is expected to announce his decision on where he will be playing college football beginning in 2024. Nwaneri is rated as the No. 1 player at his position and the No. 3 player nationally in the 2024 class by both 247Sports and Rivals. He would be the highest-rated recruit to commit to the Sooners since Williams in 2021 and one of the highest-rated defensive linemen in OU’s football history.
The 6-foot, 5-inch, 250-pound DE from Lee’s Summit North High School in the Greater Kansas City area is expected to choose between Oklahoma and Missouri, although, as you might expect, he received scholarship offers from a wide list of major college programs. Oklahoma has been in the lead for Nwaneri’s recruitment for quite a while, but the home-state team reportedly has been gaining some favor over the past few weeks.
Elite defensive line recruits have been a primary objective of Oklahoma’s recruiting plan the past two cycles since Brent Venables became head coach. In the Sooners’ No. 4-rated 2023 class they added five-star defensive end Adepoju “P.J.” Adebawore, also out of the Kansas City area along with D-line transfers Da’Jon Terry (from Tennessee) and Rondell Bothroyd (from Wake Forest). The two transfers are expected to have an immediate impact for the OU defense in the coming season, and Adebawore should find his way into considerable playing time as well.
But that was just the beginning of the defensive line strength Venables wants to build at Oklahoma as the Sooners prepare to enter the SEC, a league renowned for size, strength and speed defensively, a year from now.
That is why Nwaneri is such a huge get for the Sooners. The fact that Oklahoma will be in the SEC when Nwaneri enters his first college season helps mitigate that selling point that Missouri might have had over OU in the recruitment of the highly touted defensive recruit.
With Nwaneri’s commitment decision coming up, over the next three weeks Oklahoma is on the cusp of potentially reeling in the best defensive line class in the history of the school. And that’s saying something for a program with the fifth highest winning percentage all-time (934-338-53, .725) and tied for the third most national championships (7).
In adddition to Nwaneri, the Sooners are also favored to pick up the 2024 commitment of another five-star defensive lineman in David Stone, who is scheduled to announce on Aug. 26. Oklahoma is also projected to land in the recruitment of four-star DL Nigel Smith II, who will announce on Sept. 6. Nwaneri is the top-rated DL in the 2024 class nationally, Stone is No. 3 in the class and Smith is No, 12.
Obviously, these three pickups would be a monumental coup for OU in its plan to retool the Sooner defense into a championship-level unit.
Of note in the recruitment of Stone, who is from Oklahoma and grew up a Sooner fan but is currently at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, his teammate at IMG Academy, DL Jayden Jackson, has already committed to OU’s 2024 class.
The appeal of Oklahoma, the SEC and, of course, Venables and his defensive coaches has been readily apparent in OU’s ability to recruit and sign top-rated defensive talent as compared with the Lincoln Riley years when five- and four-star defensive players would hardly look at OU, let alone commit to the Sooners.
Anyway you want to look at it, the next several weeks are going to be incredibly important to the Oklahoma football program as the Sooners get set to open their final season as a member of the newly expanded Big 12.
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