You got any feeling one way or the other whether or not he'll play? And if so, maybe how he'll look or what maybe his practice regimen has been as he's been out these first five, six weeks?

No, I don't know that stuff.

I do think that there's a pretty good chance he's going to play this week, I think.

And when this report comes out here in, what do we got, an hour and a half or so now, if it moves to probable, then I think that we are almost assuredly going to see him barring a late-week setback.

I don't know that for sure.

Just kind of reading the tea leaves of what Brent said at his press conference, And kind of what you're hearing around the program is that he's really close.

I don't think they're in any way ever going to try to put him in harm's way.

Do you share the opinion of Coach Stoops? Not necessarily.

Oh.

It's blocked, recovered.

Was he in the end zone or not? Officials talking about it.

Touchdown or safety, what do you got? Touchdown.

In the shotgun, John Mater takes it.

Handoff Avant, big hole over the right side.

He's in the clear, 35, 40.

Uh, but what did you see on the field that maybe feels like, uh, they found something, or there's some, some areas to build on?

What you get from your offense outside of not making the catastrophic mistake, I feel like if you can decisively win those two phases, you can have a chance to win the game.

We have to look back in the postgame and be able to directly point to points that came from the defense and from special teams, whether they score directly or give them the short field or whatever.

Big punt return, blocked punt, pick six, fumble return, something that gives the offense the ball on the 20-yard line.

It's going to take more than one, I think.

I think you're going to need it from defense and from special teams to win this game.

And even then, you've still got to have John Mateer and the offense go out and not screw it up.

So it feels like asking a lot, but every year in this game, we see a big special teams play.

My basketball one is a lot easier than football for whatever reason.

What, what's, what's the vibe check, uh, in Norman as you guys head to face your rival?

Vibes aren't great.

You know, the start to the season has not been what anyone hoped around here, especially on the offensive side of the ball, almost entirely on the offensive side of the ball.

Uh, they're two and two.

The losses are nothing to be embarrassed about.

At Michigan and at Georgia, you know, a lot of teams lose there, but it's the way it's happened.

They just are struggling to do anything offensively.

Toby, with Bedlam gone, is this without a doubt, like, slam dunk this is Oklahoma's biggest game on the calendar every year? Is that accurate?

Jonathan Hatten, Lloyd Avant, John Matusiak.

Um, I will go, one, John Matusiak, two, Lloyd Avant, three, Jonathan Hatten.

Um, I think Jonathan Hatten has a chance to have a bigger role in this game than he has in the past.

The thing that gives me pause is what we were just talking about, is the absolute necessity of not getting your running... your quarterback blown up.

And, uh, I'm, I don't know, Ted, maybe you, you've watched the film better than me to know how good he's been at blocking and knowing his assignments and everything.

I, it feels like they trust Avant a little bit more than him, in that category anyway.

So, uh, but if he gets rolling and you get a ground game going, then let's just keep feeding him the football and we'll worry about that later.

I feel like that may be one of those, T-Row, where they're gonna try and play it on time, and lightning in the area, they may kick that thing off at midnight or something crazy.

Yeah

... you're the head coach.

The buck stops with you.

But, you know, you hire Mike Leach, and you let him run his offense, or Mark Mangino or whoever it is.

And Brent has done that, and it's not working.

Like, his side of the ball, the defensive side of the ball, is great, and it wasn't that way when he got here.

And he has turned Oklahoma's defense into something we can all be proud of, one of the best in the country.

So much hype coming in

What do you think this OU offense does best?

Beat itself.

Unfortunately, yeah.

Probably.

That's probably not the question you were asking.

I would say they have established so far two, you know, legitimate playmakers at the pass catcher positions.

I think Satania and Rocky beers are, you know, they have put up really good numbers in an offense that is struggling and has faced Maybe the best set of defenses any team has faced in the country this year, especially after Saturday.

But how do you think just – I guess from your viewpoints, maybe not so much even the everyday fan, but from your viewpoint, how much would this change the perception of the season for you if you go and beat your biggest rival, who also is the number one team in the country? How big of a game is it in terms of – Turning the season around, I guess.

It always looks like a place you just do not pull in because of how many people are there, in my mind.

Okay, so...

Teddy...

Teddy should not go to Bucky's.

It is not a fit for him.

And...

I want to preface the rest of this comment by saying I am a proud supporter of Love's Travel Stops, our man Gabe Eichert, and they are a great sponsor of ours and have been for many, many years.

I know we talked yesterday, but quarterback situation, offensive situation for the University of Oklahoma, anything cross your mind about what you think they might do, what you think they should do, just different options, maybe looking forward to the Texas game and the rest of the season?

But at some point you can't just keep throwing somebody out there that's making catastrophic mistakes like that.

Yeah.

I mean, ideally you want your quarterback to win games for you, and at the very least you want him to not lose games for you.

and he's losing games for them.

I mean, you can directly put the last three losses, in large part anyway, on his pick six against Alabama, the interception against Michigan, and three times this week.

So you've got such a good defense that if you could just find a quarterback that wouldn't beat you, it might work out.

Now, I don't know what Whit Neubauer is.

There was some interesting stuff happening.

conference.

There's just naturally, and I talked to a doctor, kind of an expert in this category, just about knee dislocation.

And when that happens, it kind of snaps back into place, and there's natural damage.

bruising that takes place.

The pain he's suffering is more or less a bone bruise, it sounds like.

I'm saying in general when this happens.

I'm not saying specifically to David Stone.

Yeah.

Do you have any ideas? I don't know.

I think you're right.

Like, you know, basketball, you may shuffle the starting lineup.

Yeah.

Baseball, you may shuffle the pitching rotation or move some guys in and out or shuffle the lineup around a little bit.

I don't know in football if that's the right answer or not.

I think probably it's either your quarterback or who's calling the plays.

Was that a unique press conference for Brent Venable since he's been the head coach here?

What, if anything, could you take from his temperament in the interview and how he's feeling about his football team?

I did get an opportunity to chat with the University of Oklahoma's football coach, head football coach Brent Venables, and a couple of things.

One, I asked him what he would like for the identity of his offense to be.

And he said two words, explosive and aggressive.

And then he expounded on that from there about how you accomplish those things, be it the run game or otherwise.

But I thought that was of note.

The other thing was he said, if you thought UTEP threw a bunch of different looks at us with their offense, wait until you see these guys.

I think they're going to try to win this football game because it feels like there's some buildup and maybe he sees this as the opportunity to go get that next big job if you've got a team like Oklahoma that maybe looks like a wounded animal to some degree right now.

Yards, last year

439 allowed through the first two games.

This year, 461.

Last year, 4 of 25 on third downs through the first two.

This is the defense allowing.

4 of 25.

This year, 6 of 26.

But, frankly, the offensive line play hasn't been so drastically improved that you can just ditch that piece of the puzzle, you know?

Um, what, what did you think of the offensive game plan, and do you expect changes going forward? I guess, I guess what I'm asking is, are they getting the, the most out of Mateer? Are they putting him in the right spots, or do you expect a pivot?

Well, I ho- I, I, I hope for [laughs] a pivot.

That's not gonna...

What they did Saturday is not gonna work.

So I don't know what the game plan was, Ted.

I, I, you know? I mean, I felt like there was a, an easy-to-identify game plan in the opener against UTEP.

Multiple tight end sets, work the play action off of it, and even the running game was identifiable.

I guess, where do you start, or where, where's your mind go to begin with?

Agree.

That's, That's Lloyd Carr's grandson.

That's C.J. Carr's brother who might win the Heisman this year.

So I get why, you know, they paid Bryce Underwood a lot of money.

But it made huge headlines when they did it, when they signed him.

But he's making per year what a lot of guys are making per year.

You know, he's making $3 or $4 million a year, which I think maybe our guys make in that neighborhood.

There's some decent games out there within the SEC.

What's going on? Why is it happening?

I think it's posturing.

I think that the SEC is flexing and trying to get LSU to get in line and making a threat that if push came to shove, I cannot... see them getting two-thirds vote they've got to have two-thirds vote so they got to have 10 people or maybe yeah 10 out of 15 right so i don't i can't imagine that that would happen the war a world in which they voted lsu out and you could get 10 universities on your side is hard for me to fathom but i think they're trying to not give in here and just let lsu have its way and so They are threatening to as great of an extent as they possibly can.

I mean, you know, shame on LSU, right? But it's not surprising.

I mean, they hired this guy.

Look at the rest of the athletic department.

Will Wade tries to get away with everything he can.

yep no i i agree with that um i i guess the only the only other uh thought right now i have is what's the what's the temperature in oklahoma state in still water right now with with what they're faced with

Good point

... definitely the, the jersey helps.

Um, he had a great game, you know.

I mean, he's a dangerous weapon.

The thing about what'll be interesting this year is it feels like maybe the offense is gonna be more catered to taking advantage of his speed.

Like, the two and three tight end sets and all that kind of stuff is gonna set up the play action, which, which is ideal for Satauna and Harris on the outside, and we saw that in the second half when each of them had long touchdowns.

And on both of those plays, um, UTEP was blitzing.

Yeah.

He passed away and is just – Truly was a ref, Army legend, and a guy that, I mean, he loved being active and he loved sports.

Yeah.

One of my all-time favorite callers, without a doubt.

And Vinny was blind, for those who don't know.

That did not stop him from fully, fully loving sports in every way.

And we got to know Benny really well through the radio station.

Did a story with him one time at Channel 9 where we ran a race together.

He was just passionate about every intricacy of the game and the sport.

So with that in mind, Toby, what's kind of something you're really looking forward to tonight? I guess we really haven't gone into the nuts and bolts of the game tonight, but T-Row, why don't you kick us off there? What are you looking forward to? What's kind of got your attention?

I think the storyline of the preseason, of the spring, of the summer, and of the preseason is have they improved offensively, right? I mean, everybody knows how great Brent Venable's defense was a year ago, and the expectations are it's going to be really, really good again.

Maybe better, but really, really good again.

And they still got to the college football playoff last year with an offense that was 112th in the country in running the football and 13th in the SEC.

So the whole effort, a lot of the effort for Coach Venable's coaching staff was to improve that side of the ball.

They made some

improvements.

Coaching staff hirings there certainly hit the transfer portal hard.

What are you, in a game like this, what are you hoping you're walking out thinking or saying about the offense tomorrow night?

I mean, I think every opinion is going to be tempered with who the opponent is, obviously.

But What you hope you come out of a game like this feeling is that they were dominant, that they took care of the football and they moved it at will and especially ran it at will.

It doesn't mean that they're going to do it against Michigan.

It doesn't mean that they're going to do it against Georgia.

But if you have issues against UTEP, that's a sign of maybe something troubling.

So I think the best case scenario is that John Mateer looks great.

Is there a player either side of the ball that you are... really excited to watch maybe a newcomer, maybe a portal guy, maybe a young player, or maybe just someone like Satania who's coming in, uh, ready to, to take the success from last year and run with it.

Is that the same answer in Week 2?

Not necessarily.

I wouldn't be surprised if at the end of the night Xavier Robinson has had more carries and more yards.

I do think Lloyd Avant will be the first back out there.

He was there the entire fall.

And not that he hasn't earned it, but I think as a tip of the cap, he'll be the first guy out there and get the first carry.

And I think he's good.

Yeah,

But does anybody stand out for you as number one in that?

I mean, those are the two.

We're all excited to see Jonathan Hatton carry the football.

And Trill Harris has received so much praise over the last couple of weeks that if he can legitimately be – 1A or 1B to Isaiah Cetania's 1A, then, I mean, they got something this year.

You know, forget about Livingston and Thomas.

If they can just both be equally dynamic weapons, that's pretty exciting.

And, you know, the other thing about this offense, I don't know if we've talked about enough, is they have completely revamped the size of the pass catcher.

similar between those guys.

Any of those games grab your attention at all?

I mean, I'll watch TCU and North Carolina because, like you guys, I'm craving college football.

And so I have some moderate interest in that played over there in Ireland.

I think TCU is going to kill them.

But I will watch – I'll hate watch USC until that one gets out of hand a little bit.

But, yeah, I'm excited.

We got high school football tonight.

player

Who are all the players affected by you thought that they were eligible, and now they're not for basketball?

Well, it looks like, so we had a chance to talk to Porter yesterday, an interview you can see on our Oklahoma's Own YouTube channel.

He was great.

We talked about a bunch of players and the Puerto Rico trip, the schedule.

I think people enjoy it.

It's about a 15, 20-minute conversation.

And in the middle of that, he kind of just dropped on us that a cold agak had been denied his waiver by the NCAA.

You'll see live odds, I'm sure.

But, you know, the big news on the basketball side, you know, keeping Porter Moser and saying we're going to give you some backing, it – Sounds like he has lived up to that word because they continue to make moves this offseason, T-Row.

Yeah, and the dogs are very excited about the additions in the transfer portal.

Yeah, no, I agree.

Listen, we talked about this yesterday with Travis and Tyler, but Duke Brennan is a big-time get.

They were going against some other big-time schools for his services yesterday.

It's a 6'10 big man that's a walking double-double.

He can score.

So I'm kind of, I kind of feel like if material plays well, then Satania or whoever else at wide receiver kind of is a, will be a product of that.