At Oklahoma, Brent Venables Wants 'a Whole Locker Room Full of Guys' Like Drake Stoops
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NORMAN — Reliable cloning technology may be a hundred years away. Maybe it’ll never happen.
But if it does? Drake Stoops might be a good candidate.
“You want to have a whole locker room full of guys like that,” Oklahoma coach Brent Venables said.
Stoops is the son of Bob and Carol Stoops, twin brother of Isaac. When your dad is in the College Football Hall of Fame and owns more coaching victories than any of the luminaries at a place like OU, expectations — and maybe pressure — is high.
But it’s not too high for Drake Stoops, who was up for the William V. Campbell Trophy and the Brandon Burlsworth Award and may be voted permanent captain and probably will take home something big from OU’s postseason awards banquet.
In Venables’ eyes, Stoops represents what he wants in a college football player.
“You want young people of excellence,” Venables said. “You want as many guys like that as you can. You hope other people learn from them.
“I think environment is important and people are contagious. Having a bunch of guys that know how to work, how to respond, how to have the right attitude every day. What they do off the field is the same as what they do on the field. They autograph all their work with excellence, and Drake has been a great example of that.”
Stoops is a fifth-year senior who began his college career as a walk-on before Lincoln Riley awarded him a scholarship. Through nine games, he’s fifth on the team with 21 catches for 191 yards with two touchdowns, including one last week against Baylor on a wicked goal-line juke. Stoops also has run for 48 yards on eight rushes.
Back in October, after OU lost to Texas, Stoops said he drew from his famous dad on how to step up his leadership.
“I definitely feel the urgency to win football games,” Stoops said at the time. “Of course, we’d love to turn it around. But at the end of the day, it comes down to winning each game and going 1-0 each week. As a competitor, you never like to lose. The goal is always to win.”
Now that the Sooners have lost another game and stand at 5-4 heading to this week’s trip to West Virginia, that attitude and that mindset seem more important than ever. Bowl games are not the goal at a place like Oklahoma, but the team needs one more win to reach the postseason and land 15 bowl practices and create something positive heading into the offseason.
Players like Stoops can spearhead what Venables hopes is a strong finish.
“We have a bunch of other guys that are committed in the same way,” Venables said. “We want to nurture that and be a program that represents that.”
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