Three Ways Oklahoma’s Brent Venables Can Solidify Himself as a Top 10 Coach

Brent Venables enjoyed his best season as the Sooners' coach in 2025, but he still must do more to prove that he's one of the nation's best head coaches.

Oklahoma coach Brent Venables | Carson Field / Sooners On SI

Talking season is in full effect.

With still over a month until the 2026 season, networks, analysts and college football talking heads have begun ranking everything from players to coaches, teams and gameday atmospheres.

Last week, ESPN ranked the top 10 coaches in college football, polling a pool of its reporters.

Absent from ESPN’s list was Oklahoma coach Brent Venables, who led the Sooners to their first College Football Playoff appearance since 2019 last year. 

Five SEC coaches — Georgia’s Kirby Smart (No. 2), Texas’ Steve Sarkisian (6), LSU’s Lane Kiffin (7), Texas A&M’s Mike Elko (8) and Alabama’s Kalen DeBoer (T-10) — made it into the top 10, while Vanderbilt’s Clark Lea received one vote.

Venables came into 2025 on the hot seat, but the Sooners’ 10-3 campaign allowed it to cool down by about 50 degrees. He and his team now come into 2026 with expectations of making it back to the CFP.

Here are three ways Venables can establish himself as a top 10 coach:

Seasons like 2025 become the norm

OU’s 2025 campaign was great. 

After losing to Texas and Ole Miss in the middle part of the season, the Sooners rattled off wins against Tennessee, Alabama, Missouri and LSU en route to the CFP. Despite losing 34-24 to the Crimson Tide in the playoff, the Sooners showed that they’re headed in the right direction under Venables.

Venables, though, needs to put together these kinds of seasons consistently.

The coach certainly gets a pass for the Sooners’ 6-7 campaign in 2022 — the first year of his tenure — when he took over for Lincoln Riley. OU followed that up with a 10-3 season in 2023 before going 6-7 again in 2024.

This pattern of mediocre season-good season suggests that Oklahoma is due for an underwhelming campaign in 2026. But if Venables can lead his team to another impressive season this fall, it will prove that he’s capable of leading a winning program year in and year out.

Overcoming OU’s struggles in the CFP

Despite being one of college football’s most successful programs, both recently and historically, the Sooners have struggled in the CFP.

OU is 0-5 all-time in playoff games. 

The only one of those losses that came under Venables was last year’s 10-point loss to Alabama in the first round. Oklahoma took a 17-0 lead in the second quarter before the Crimson Tide scored 27 unanswered points and eventually won 34-24.

OU has won seven national titles in its history, and while CFP appearances are great, postseason wins are better.

If Venables can finally lead the Sooners to playoff success, he will receive greater praise, both locally and nationally.

Beat Texas… regularly

Venables only has a four-game sample size against OU’s greatest foe, but so far, he’s struggled against the Longhorns.

Texas has won three of the last four installments of the Red River Rivalry. The Sooners have lost the last two meetings in the rivalry series, most recently falling 23-6 to a Texas squad that didn’t reach the CFP last year.

Though Texas holds a 65-51-5 lead over Oklahoma all time, the Sooners have been more successful in the modern era with a 16-10 record since 2000. OU won five of the six regular-season meetings against the Longhorns from 2016 to 2021 — right before Venables took over.

Regularly defeating the Longhorns is a requirement for any OU coach, and Venables must start leading his team to Red River Rivalry wins.