May, June and July are especially active months in securing college football commitments in every recruiting cycle. Oklahoma's 2026 class is ample evidence of that fact with 13 of the Sooners' 15 commits occurring in the past three months and nine in June alone.
There are still almost five months to go before the early signing period in December, but with only a small number of Oklahoma's top targets in the 2026 class still uncommitted and a current class ranking ranging from 24th (Rivals) to 34th (247Sports), there is mounting reason for some concern by Sooner fans.
The Sooners' 2026 class currently ranks 10th among the 16 SEC schools (9th by Rivals). The six schools that 247Sports ranks behind Oklahoma at this point are Mississippi State, Kentucky, Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Missouri and Auburn. The latter three are on OU's 2025 schedule.
Oklahoma's 2000 recruiting class, the first one that Bob Stoops had a full hand in securing, ranked 24th nationally. More on that a little later. Since the 2000 class, the lowest a Sooner recruiting class has been ranked in the final analysis has been 19th in 2016. Over the last 25 cycles, Oklahoma's average recruiting class ranking has been 10.9 with 16 top-10 rankings, according to the 247Sports Composite.
Of Brent Venables' four recruiting classes (2022-25), only one, the 2025 class, was ranked outside of the top-10 on a national scale. What has heightened the concern surrounding OU's 2026 class is the number of elite prospects who had Oklahoma as finalists in their decision-making process but ended up committing elsewhere.
Recruiting misses of OU top targets have been atypical in 2026 cycle
In recent days, Oklahoma has lost out on four-star S Jacob Eberhart (to Illinois), four-star DL Tajh Overton (to Oklahoma State), three-star WR Dallas Dickerson (to Kentucky), four-star CB Danny Odem (to Nebraska), four-star WR Jordan Clay and even an OU family legacy in three-star TE Josiah Jefferson, the brother of former Oklahoma safety Tony Jefferson. Jefferson recently committed to Utah. All were Oklahoma targets.
In addition, the Sooners typically get several recruits from the state of Oklahoma in each recruiting cycle. In fact, Venables had made it a priority to not let the best players in the Sooner State get away. The Sooners have no commitments so far in the 2026 class from the state of Oklahoma and no more offers left on the table. Meanwhile, in-state rival Oklahoma State has seven such commitments.
One of those seven OSU in-state commits was three-star DB Braeden Presley out of Bixby, Oklahoma, who the Sooners were extremely high on. Presley has two brothers who played for Oklahoma State, however, but he did have OU among his four finalists.
Although Venables and the Sooners have won several recruiting battles in the 2026 cycle over major programs -- QB Bowe Bentley (over LSU), OL Deacon Schmitt (over Alabama), TE Tyler Ruxer (over three Big Ten schools) and RB DeZephen Walker (over K-State and Nebraska) -- the number of top OU targets who, after the final push and shove, have opted to go elsewhere seems atypically high this cycle.
It may be because of the uncertainty of how truly competitive Oklahoma can be under Venables in the traditional football powerhouse that is the SEC. That is also why the 2025 season is a critical one for Venables and his future at OU.
While the pickings among what were once Oklahoma top 2026 recruiting targets has narrowed considerably, Oklahoma is still considered the favorite to land four-star WR Davian Groce out of Lone Star High School in Frisco, Texas, the same high school that produced former Sooner star Marvin Mims Jr. Also of note in Groce's recruitment, his high school teammate, TE Ryder Mix, has already committed to the Sooners for 2026.
Oklahoma is also projected to land four-star edge rusher Jake Kreul out of IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, the same program that produced D-linemen David Stone and Jayden Jackson. Kreul is rated as the No. 4 edge rusher nationally.
Recruiting class rankings, of course, are meaningless unless they translate to performance on the field. They merely serve as an early indicator of what teams might expect from the talent pipeline in the future. The talent coming out high school is still raw and unproven at the college level, where the level of competition and talent is much greater. Recruiting prospects still must be coached and developed to reach their full potential.
As an example, Oklahoma's 2000 recruiting class, 27 strong, was ranked 24th nationally. That class produced such future OU stars as OT Jammal Brown, LB Dan Cody, All-American LB Teddy Lehmann, WR Mark Clayton, WR Antonio Perkins, who holds the NCAA record with three punt returns for touchdowns in the same game, DE Jimmy Wilkerson and RB Renaldo Works. All but Works went on to play in the NFL after college.
So you just never know until the games are played and the wins and losses recorded who the future stars and prime contributors are going to be. At this stage, though, all we have to go by is how the various national recruiting services evaluate and rank each of the respective college football recruiting classes.
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