Oklahoma raced out to a 14-0 lead on Navy.

The Midshipmen scored the game’s next 21 points to end Brent Venables‘ third season in Norman with a fitting defeat. In a dud of a season, Oklahoma closed with a dud of a loss. The Sooners had energy early, but Navy snatched away the momentum in the second quarter and then controlled the line of scrimmage to build a 21-14 lead.

Oklahoma scored with 6 seconds remaining after a 13-play, 65-yard drive but rather than kick the point-after and play for overtime, the Sooners tried for 2 and the win. Navy sacked quarterback Michael Hawkins Jr. in the backfield to preserve the lead and seal the win.

Here are 3 takeaways from the game.

Brent Venables joins awful company…

For Navy, the victory caps a 10-3 season and gives the program its first bowl win since 2019. It’s just the sixth 10-win season in program history for the Midshipmen.

The history made on Friday was less rosy for the Crimson and Cream. Oklahoma closes the year 6-7 with the bowl defeat. From 1999-2021, Oklahoma had a winning record at the end of every season. Venables now has 2 losing seasons in 3 years with the program. That puts him alongside John Blake as the only 2 OU coaches since 1947 to have multiple losing seasons during their tenure. Blake was fired after 3 years.

Venables won’t be getting a call from OU athletic director Joe Castiglione for the bowl showing, but he’ll enter the 2025 season very much on the hot seat.

The Sooner offense was coordinated by Joe Jon Finley on Friday in the bowl game. Now, Ben Arbuckle will take over. The offense was quarterbacked by Hawkins on Friday. Washington State transfer John Mateer is expected to win the starting job for 2025. Hawkins didn’t make the crippling mistakes that cost him the job in his last start (a disastrous day against South Carolina), but neither he nor Finley did much to inspire.

The OU offense turned it over on downs in the red zone in the second quarter, fumbled on the first play of a third-quarter possession, and missed a fourth-quarter field goal from the Navy 34 in a tied game. The Sooners averaged 3.3 yards per play on first down, were in third-down spots a ton, and had a 56-yard touchdown wiped away because of holding. On the penultimate play of the game, OU touched an onside attempt early and lost track of the football as it bounced around in the open field. There were positives, but there were too many areas worthy of criticism.

Hiring Arbuckle and landing Mateer from the portal generated some juice for the Sooners in recent weeks. Friday’s game sapped at least a little of it. And maybe that’s unfair to Venables. The Sooners had fewer than 60 scholarship players available to them for the bowl game and were working with a ton of backups on offense. But after the first 10 minutes, OU found itself in a fight and Navy consistently hit harder. Sooner fans won’t accept that.

Michael Hawkins makes the most of his start

Given the circumstances, Hawkins played admirably. He had an all-freshman receiving corps. He was behind an offensive line that underperformed all year long. And he still finished with 247 passing yards while completing 65% of his passes, 61 rushing yards, and 2 scores without an interception.

He had one of the highlights of the game:

And he engineered the touchdown drive that gave OU a chance to win the game at the end. He converted a fourth-and-6, a third-and-5, and then scored with 6 seconds remaining. When the drive began at the OU 35, the Sooners had 1 timeout and needed a touchdown. Hawkins showed glimpses of his promise. As a dual-threat passer, he can do some nice things. There are areas of his game that need to be worked on, but he’s also a true freshman who was never supposed to be in this position.

I’m curious to see what happens with Hawkins going forward. He’s expected to stick around in Norman and fight with Wazzu transfer John Mateer. He’s not expected to win that battle, but if Arbuckle is anything more than a 1-and-done in Norman (he’s most likely tied to Venables), perhaps he can mold Hawkins into a winning quarterback.

OU defense disappoints

Maybe the group was just over the season. Maybe the Sooners thought they were going to roll after going up 14-0 on their first 2 offensive possessions. Whatever the reason, OU was disappointing on the defensive side of the ball. Navy had 11 first downs and still managed 21 points. Navy snapped it 53 times and had 4 plays of at least 20 yards. Quarterback Blake Horvath had a 95-yard rushing touchdown. The Midshipmen ran for 226 yards and OU only stopped 4 plays in the backfield for a loss.

Derek Peterson

Derek Peterson does a bit of everything, not unlike Taysom Hill. He has covered Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Pac-12, and now delivers CFB-wide content.

Share.
2024 © Network Today. All Rights Reserved.