It wasn’t that long ago that the Oklahoma Sooners were struggling to get stops. The Mike Stoops days were fraught with high-scoring affairs that asked Baker Mayfield and the Sooners offense to score 40 points every week for them to have a chance.
For the program that once won a national championship with a 13-2 win over Florida State in the Orange Boal, this was a far cry from the early Bob Stoops era.
However, things have changed as Alex Grinch, and the defensive coaching staff have begun to end the narrative that the Sooners don’t play defense.
Back in 2015, the Sooners defense could only hold their opponents under 24 points three times in 13 games. In 2016, that number improved to four games under 24 points in 13 games. And, in 2017, the Sooners were able to hold opponents under 24 points five times in 14 games, but then that number fell back to four games with under 24 points in 2018.
In 2019, Alex Grinch’s first year as the defensive coordinator, the Sooners held half of their 14 opponents under 24 points in a game. In 2020, they held seven of their 11 opponents under 24 points.
Oklahoma has consistently had one of the best offense’s in college football for years. Typically they’ve been able to score 30 or more points on teams, and they won a lot of shootouts. However, that wasn’t a recipe for success because their defense couldn’t always get stops. In 2019, that started to change, and it continued to improve in 2020.
2020 wasn’t a perfect year, and it’s proof that Grinch and the coaching staff have work to do. In their two losses, they allowed 38 points to Kansas State and 37 points to Iowa State in back-to-back weeks. Against Texas, they allowed 31 in regulation, but the Longhorns stormed back with 14 points in the final five minutes of the game to send it to overtime, where it took a Woodi Washington interception to end the game in the fourth overtime.
In the big games against their top competition, the Sooners have to do better. However, the commitment of four-star defensive lineman Derrick Moore shows that the Sooners are on their way to changing the national perception of the Oklahoma Sooners’ defense. Ohio State and Penn State heavily pursued Moore. For the Sooners to land the top-flight pass rusher from Maryland (deep in the heart of Big 10 country) has to signify the good things happening for the Sooners defense.
Alex Grinch and the Sooners are building something in Norman. Although they lost Ronnie Perkins, Tre Brown, and Tre Norwood to the NFL, the Sooners still have a ton of talent that could make this unit the best they’ve had in the last decade.