The good, the bad and the ugly from Oklahoma's season-opening blowout vs. UTEP

When you score 51 points and hold an opponent scoreless, it's almost a sure bet that plenty of things went right, which they certainly did in Oklahoma's 51-0 season-opening demolition of UTEP on Friday night before a sold-out Palace on the Prairie.

For sure, far more good than bad came out of the Sooners' Game 1 performance, which you would expect playing the easiest opponent on the regular-season schedule, but there are still plenty of things that need to get cleaned up, and quickly, as the quality of the opponents ramps up considerably over the next four games and for the remainder of the season.

The 10th-ranked Sooners hit the road this weekend, traveling to Ann Arbor, Michigan, to face the 16th-ranked (for now) Michigan Wolverines. That contest appears slightly less daunting following the Wolverines' controversial miracle last-second win at home against Group of Six opponent Western Michigan on Saturday. But the Sooners expect that a much different and more determined Michigan team will show up at home this weekend.

An Oklahoma win Saturday at Michigan would serve as a major tone-setter heading into games over the next four weeks against Georgia and Texas, both of which are likely to be ranked in the top-10 of the both major national polls, if not the top five.

But let's not get ahead of ourselves. Here is a breakdown of what we observed in last Friday's win over outmanned and overmatched UTEP:

The good

There was plenty to like from the debut of Oklahoma Team 132 under the lights on Friday. The offense was the central focus for Brent Venables and his coaches in the offseason, with specific concerns about quarterback John Mateer and what he would be like in 2026 after playing most of last season recovering from a fractured thumb. The nation's 92nd-ranked offense a year ago was hindered not just by Mateer's injured throwing hand, but also by virtually a non-existent running game, along with a dearth of reliable receiving targets.

Mateer completed 11-of-17 passes for 225 yards and three touchdowns in the season opener vs. UTEP before being pulled late in the third quarter. The second-year Sooner starter did miss several throws, but the ones he completed, including the three touchdown passes, were right on the money and his 234.1 pass efficiency rating was one of the highest of his OU career.

Oklahoma averaged just 118 yards on the ground last season. The Sooners ran for 170 yards against UTEP, and 140 of those yards were produced by three players who weren't on the roster last season. Colorado State transfer Lloyd Avant, who appears to have locked down the No. 1 spot for the time being, gained 79 yards on 15 carries and a touchdown. Freshman Jonathan Hatton Jr. had 21 yards on just three carries and Ben McCreary, a transfer from Incarnate Word, rambled for 40 yards on six attempts.

On the receiving end, senior wide receiver Isaiah Sategna did what the Sooners' top receiver does, hauling in four of five targets, including an impressive 48 yards after the catch, and a 34-yard touchdown. The former Arkansas transfer also had an 88-yard punt return for a touchdown, for which he earned the honor of SEC Special Teams Player of the Week.

Wide receiver Trell Harris and tight end Rocky Beers, both new this season out of the transfer portal, also were impressive in their Oklahoma debuts. Harris caught two passes for 61 yards and a touchdown, and Beers had two receptions, including a spectacular 40-yard touchdown catch in which he hurdled a UTEP defender for the score.

The Oklahoma defense showed it has the potential to be even better than the unit that led the SEC and ranked in the top 10 nationally last season. The Sooners held UTEP to zero points and just 198 total yards. It was the first season-opening shutout by an OU defense since 2013 (34-0 vs. Louisiana-Monroe) and the third overall under Venables as head coach.

Unnecessary and costly penalites have been a big problem area for the Sooners in recent seasons. In Friday's game with UTEP, the Sooners were flagged just three times for 30 yards, the worst of which was a 15-yard personal foul penalty called against safety Michael Boganowski late in the second quarter with Oklahoma leading 27-0. The call came well inside the UTEP side of the 50-yard line, but it still was an unnecessary infraction.

The bad

Although the Oklahoma offensive line played well enough to win this game with three starters out and didn't allow a sack of John Mateer while enabling 170 rushing yards, the concern is that this was against a much inferior team than what OU will face the rest of the season. We appear to be headed down the same old road as the past three or four years with consistency and continuity of offensive line play severely hindered by injuries. Starting center Jake Maikkula and right guard/center Ryan Fodje were both ruled out of the season opener with injuries, and former five-star recruit and left tackle Michael Fasusi left the UTEP game with an undisclosed injury.

As well as Oklahoma's defense performed in shutting down the UTEP offense, Brent Venables was not happy with the overall performance of his defense.

"There's plenty of things we got to clean up," he said. "They didn't make us pay, but good teams are going to make us pay going forward."

The ugly

It's a little ironic that the "ugly" designation from the UTEP game would be directed to the area that actually represents the strength of the Oklahoma team, but that's because Oklahoma football teams are held to and expected to play to a standard, and the sloppy way the Sooner defense tackled against UTEP fell well short of that standard.

"I thought we were sloppy tackling on defense," Venables said. "I didn't like that at all."

The Sooner defense was credited with four sacks and 10 tackles for loss against UTEP. OU led the country in both of those categories last season. But that effort was overshadowed by the disappointing number of missed tackles, which by one count was as many as a dozen. You might be able to get away with that against teams like UTEP, but when you are playing good teams, which Oklahoma will see plenty of in the SEC, a missed tackle on a running play that ends up gaining eight yards could easily end up as 75 yards and a cloud of dust against a team like Georgia or Texas.

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