Like Its Head Coach, Oklahoma Showed Grit, Toughness and 'Sheer Will' to Topple Alabama

TUSCALOOSA, AL — Brent Venables has been through some things — hardships that might break most men.

The Oklahoma coach has stood beside his partner of nearly 30 years, wife Julie, and their kids as she has fiercely battled breast cancer for three years.

He coached the Sooners to a losing record twice in his first three years — something that gnaws on his ultra-competitive spirit from the inside.

Last year he had to fire a longtime friend, colleague and former player, Seth Littrell, then publicly own up to the mistake of Littrell’s promotion to offensive coordinator.

This past offseason, Venables gave back a million dollars of his contract — publicly, to help OU’s NIL efforts; privately, maybe his $7 million annual salary was weighing on him after the poor performances his teams were putting on the field.

But Saturday, Venables stood among friends and family and thousands of citizens from Sooner Nation who gathered in the northeast corner of Alabama’s hallowed Saban Field at Bryant-Denny Stadium, cheering, chanting, lifting up Venables and his players with their vocal support and applause. The coach was buoyed by their outpouring of emotion, but not as much as he was by his players’ grit and resolve. Ultimately, Venables smiled, a big, hearty grin from ear to ear, as everyone reveled in OU’s gutty 23-21 victory over the No. 4-ranked Alabama Crimson Tide.

After the Sooners got lots of big plays and good breaks, the Tide came back to take the lead with three touchdowns (and a missed field goal) in the span of four offensive possessions.

No problem. OU took it right back with their third field goal, then Venables’ defense turned away the dynamic, prolific Tide offense on four successive drives to end Bama’s nation-leading 17-game home winning streak.

Venables used the words “toughness” and “sheer will” to describe the defense that has been through some things — hardships that might break most teams.

So I asked him how, in back-to-back games, the Sooner defense has gone on the road in the SEC and won hard games mostly because it was Venables’ defense that stood tall and virtually deprived the home team’s offense of a pulse.

“They haven’t flinched,” Venables said. “When the fire is raging, when things are looking a little desolate, they have responded several times this year. Certainly, have the last couple of weeks when it has mattered the most.”

Afterwards, those OU defenders — and even their offensive teammates — wore black T-shirts with “HARD TO KILL” printed on the front and “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH” emblazoned on the back.

Venables asked the team ahead of the Tennessee game, “When is enough, enough?”

Saturday, he got his answer.

Cornerback Eli Bowen, who had an 87-yard interception return for a touchdown, said Venables came up with the T-shirts, an idea from the recent film, “Gladiator 2.”

“We watch that all the time in our team meeting, clips of it and what not,” Bowen said. “And it just represents our strain to never give up and always fight even when things don’t look our way or even when people count us out to go and fight because we believe in each other.”

Quarterback John Mateer didn’t have his best game, but he did run for a 20-yard touchdown, and he helped put Tate Sandell in position for three more field goals, bringing his school-record streak of consecutive field goals to 21. Mateer, however, also showed some gladiatorial qualities.

“It’s an awesome movie,” Mateer said. “We show clips of how he will just not die. It’s a movie, I mean, but he’s getting pretty close. You know, we know what we’re up against and what the stakes are if we do lose. We’re fighting to survive, and that’s where it comes from.”

After the Sooners lost at home to Ole Miss on Oct. 25, Venables challenged his players. Enough had indeed become enough.

“We know that losing isn’t really an option — and it never is — but we let it slide,” Mateer said. “And not letting stuff like that slide can win us games.”

It was Peyton Bowen who batted down Alabama’s last-gasp, fourth-down pass.

Oklahoma, led by their indefatigable head coach, has most certainly become hard to kill.

“We have recruited a lot of tough guys that believe in themselves and each other,” Venables told me in the post game press conference. “At the end of the day, the guts and the will and the edge and the belief that comes from our players. We try to create vision for them. I think it starts with that.

“Then, it’s belief. Then you have to be able to kick the door and take the action that it requires. Then be the one that kind of lines up nose to nose. It’s about competing and competing to win.”

Defensive tackle David Stone, a local 5-star who entered the transfer portal in the offseason and then quickly changed his mind, has emerged as one of the best interior d-linemen in the country.

Saturday night, he talked openly about how Venables’ own unyielding determination has shaped this elite Oklahoma defense in his own image.

“Coach V does a wonderful job of keeping us level minded and focused on what we got to do,” Stone said. “ ‘Enough is enough’ is our mentality. Because after we do a good job, we might win a game, then the narrative moves. It’s on to what’s next. We beat ‘Bama? What’s next? We got Missouri? That’s what we got to focus on.”

“I think it’s just playing for each other,” Peyton Bowen said. “I think we have such a brotherhood and such a good connection throughout the locker room, offense and defense, I think it just makes you want to play for that person so much more.”

Stone said the team received the T-shirts on Friday night.

“I feel like it’s the mentality of our team,” Stone said. “We fight through a lot this season. We’ve went through a lot of adversity — injuries, coming back from that. Just all the challenges of the season. It’s hard to kill us. It’s hard to kill the Sooners, you know? We really got that mentality. So it came out and showed this weekend.

“It’s just a mentality. Hard to kill. It’s what you gotta live by. We practice by it every day, we show it. So it came out to fruition tonight.”

It’s been more than just his players that follow the mantra. The OU coaching staff has followed Venables’ lead.

“Yeah, unbelievable culture,” said offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle. “Unbelievable culture. And he does an unbelievable job of setting the tone every single day for the entire team. And he does a great job with the defense — and he's done a great job with defense for years. I mean, he's the absolute best in the business at what he does, and I'm thankful to be on the staff with him and get to see him coach every day and learn from him every single day.”

“When you have belief, it’s a powerful thing,” Mateer said. “We don’t fold, and we don’t turn on each other when anything goes bad. We know we’re playing good teams, and I think we’re lead by a great human and a great coach in Coach Venables and all the oher coaches around him. They give us the right message.”

Even Oklahoma’s kicker, Tate Sandell, who hasn’t missed in three months, proudly wore the “HARD TO KILL” / “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH” shirt after banging a trio of three-pointers, including a 52-yarder and a 25-yard strike that gave OU its final margin.

“After that Ole Miss game, enough was enough,” Sandell told me. “How many times we gonna let someone walk into our house and walk out with a W? … It’s just having that mindset of staying alive, blue-collar, roll your sleeves up and just find a way. And be hard to kill in the process.”

Like he always has, Venables deferred the credit for such a monumental victory.

“We have a bunch of young men who were raised right,” he said. “ … Everything has magnitude and everything matters. Our players have really bought into that.

“Have a lot of respect for our players and thought they put a lot of respect on our brand again this week for this program, for this team, Team 131 and for this conference. I thought they represented themselves in an incredible way.”