The Oklahoma Sooners are coming off their first loss of the season, falling to the [autotag]Kansas Jayhawks[/autotag]. This one was a heartbreaker as the team had every chance to win but never was able to pull it out.
Ethan Downs picked off [autotag]Jason Bean[/autotag] with around 2:30 left in the game and returned it into Jayhawks’ territory. At that point, it looked like the Sooners once again were going to pull out a victory. They needed one first down to win it, and instead of being aggressive and putting the ball in your Heisman candidates’ hands, [autotag]Jeff Lebby[/autotag] ran the ball three times, and the Sooners punted it away.
The Jayhawks would end up scoring and winning the game on their final drive. [autotag]Brent Venables[/autotag] took a lot of the blame for the loss in his post-game press conference, but this game falls back on the lack of aggression on the offensive side of the ball. [autotag]Dillon Gabriel[/autotag] had 13 passes before the final drive. He threw the ball six times on the final drive and looked pretty good doing so. His quarterback counterpart threw the ball 32 times in the game.
Venables talked in his press conference this week about the lack of deep shots and aggression by the offense. “I think the opportunity was there,” Venables said. “Wishing is not going to do anything, but we do need to maintain an aggressive mentality. There’s always that balance when you try to be efficient and protect the football, but at the same time, at the right time, take your shots. We’ve got good players who can run past people and go up and make competitive plays.”
The Sooners are going to need that aggressive mentality and play-calling this weekend with arguably the hottest team in the [autotag]Big 12[/autotag] is waiting. If they have another lackluster performance offensively and aren’t aggressive once again, the Sooners could be in some serious trouble.
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