Perhaps the most glaring statistic four games into the Oklahoma football season is the Sooners' takeaways number -- the number of intercepted passes or fumble recoveries -- which is a critical component of defensive efficiency and, ultimately, an elite defense.
Oklahoma ranks second in the SEC in both scoring defense and total defense, as well as No. 3 and No. 2 in the country, respectively, in both of those categories. Pretty impressive, right? Except for the fact the Sooner defense has yet to register a takeaway in any game this season, which is highly unusual with a defense as good as Oklahoma's has been through the first four games of the season.
Sooners lone FBS team without turnover
After hosting Kent State on Saturday, Oklahoma will face six teams currently ranked among the nation's top 25 in its final seven games of the regular season. It is extremely rare to go this far into the season, and with a defense as dominant as Oklahoma's has been, and not have any forced turnovers. The Sooners are the only team at the FBS level entering Week 6 of the season that has not forced a single turnover.
It isn't as if the Sooners haven't had their opportunities on defense. In the win over Auburn two weeks ago, both Peyton Bowen and Kendal Daniels dropped interceptions.
The lack of takeaways this season hasn't been a problem yet, but it clearly could be as the Sooners get into the most difficult portion of the schedule, where winning the turnover battle can be the difference between winning and losing.
"I don't want to be that team that's over there trying to rip at the ball and nobody's tackling," OU head coach Brent Venables said this week. "But at the same time, we have to create turnovers."
Bowen agrees with his head coach.
"We're not forcing anything," the OU junior safety safety said after the Auburn game. "I feel like teams have been very conservative against us in the way they're playing. So we just can't force nothing... We think we're playing a great brand of football and that we've just got to keep going and don't play hero ball...
"Just play within the scheme and they'll come."
Kent State just might be the remedy to Oklahoma's absence of takeaways. The Golden Flashes have committed five turnovers (three fumbles and two interceptions) through the first four games.
Read more about OU football