Oklahoma's OC hire wedged between urgency and unerring

Brent Venables has made plenty of important decisions in his stellar career as a college football coach and defensive wizard, but none that arguably has as much riding on it as the hiring of the new Oklahoma offensive coordinator.

Oklahoma still has at least two games remaining in what has been an atypical topsy -turvy season by Sooner standards, which obviously has the immediate attention of Venables and his staff, At the same time, the Sooner head coach is working through the diligent process of identifying, vetting and hiring the best candidate to become the next OU offensive coordinator.

Further complicating the process is the urgency stemming from the recruiting and transfer portal calendars that hit in the first two weeks in December this year plus the fact that the top candidates for the position are still actively immersed in the regular season just like Venables.

During his weekly press conference on Tuesday, Venables acknowledged that he wasn't going to rush the process because of the importance of getting the decision right, but he also recognized the urgency of being able name the new OC ahead of early signing day for 2025 recruits on Dec. 4 and the opening of the transfer portal window on Dec. 9.

"There's certainly (a sense of urgency to) finding the best solution to where we're at right now," Venables said on Tuesday. "But there is a real thing called the regular season that's got to finish up. And if I'm talking to the right people, which I believe I am, then they're going to be sensitive to finishing what they started and being loyal to their players."

The OU head coach said he feels like the process is in a good place to where it needs to be. He said he hasn't put a hard deadline on making the decision and getting through the necessary due diligence. There's a lot of layers to it as you can imagine," he said.

A name that has been talked about a lot in recent days is former Florida and Mississippi State head coach Dan Mullen, who is currently a college football analyst for ESPN. Asked about his potential interest in the position by ESPN colleague and former Oklahoma alum Dusty Dvoracek, "If they have a head coaching position available, have them call me."

Who knows if Mullen could be talked into taking the job. We all know that money talks, and it's probably going to take a good amount to get him. He's clearly not the only candidate that would be a good hire for this important position, but whoever the choice ultimately is, neither Venables nor the Oklahoma football program can afford to miss the mark on this one

Venables was brought back to OU at a time when the offense was one of the most productive and prolific in college football, only to be burdened by a defense that was among the very worst in the sport. That was at the end of the 2021 season.

Flash forward now three seasons later and the situation at Oklahoma is the polar opposite. Venables has made the defensive adjustments he was expected to and returned the Sooners' defense to national relevance, but the once seemingly unstoppable Sooner express has suddenly gone off the rails. It was no secret that Oklahoma needed to get much better on defense to compete at a high level in the SEC, but that was with the expectation that the Sooners' offensive excellence was already SEC worthy.

Unfortunately, in Venables' case, a head coach has responsibility as well as accountability for the entire program, not just the part he is most familiar with. That's why the most successful head coaches are the ones who are comfortable enough in their own skin and smart enough to surround themselves with assistants who are well respected and are at the top of their games, whatever the specialized area.

Aside from the head coach, the two most important positions on a football staff are the offensive and defensive coordinator. Venables' first hire in the offensive coordinator position was Jeff Lebby, who had FBS experience at the coordinator level and also happened to have OU roots as an alum. Lebby was the one primarily responsible for getting Dillon Gabriel, the former UCF transfer, to flip his commitment from UCLA to Oklahoma just hours before he was to start classes at UCLA. With Gabriel at quarterback, Lebby called plays for an OU offense that finished the 2023 season in the op-five nationally in both scoring and total offense.

Lebby was named head coach at Mississippi State after the 2023 season, and Venables made the decision to stay in-house in replacing Lebby, naming OU assistant Joe Jon Finley and offensive analyst Seth Littrell, both former Oklahoma players, co-offensive coordinators. Littrell, who was responsible for calling the offensive plays, was relieved of his duties and dismissed from the staff after seven games this season.

Who knows if Dan Mullen could be talked into taking the job. We all know that money talks, and it's probably going to take a good amount to get him. He's clearly not the only candidate that would be a good hire for this important position, but he would be a home run hire for sure.

Regardless, whoever the choice ultimately ends up being, neither Venables nor the Oklahoma football program can afford to miss the mark on this one. The future of both depends on getting this decision right -- and, yes, the clock is ticking.