During a time in college football when some programs have seven-year veterans at quarterback, the Sooners will be led by a sophomore with one full game of experience. 

Jackson Arnold will be QB1 for Oklahoma this upcoming season. He started OU’s bowl game against Arizona and threw a pass in just four games last season, completing 44-of-69 with four touchdowns. He also threw three interceptions — all of which came in that lone start against Arizona. 

And as he endures his own learning experiences of playing through a full Division I football schedule for the first time, Arnold will also guide the program into its own unknown, as OU enters its first season in the SEC. 

“After that Arizona game, there was a lot of maturing and a lot of growing up that I had to do,” Arnold said at SEC Media Days. “Stepping into that QB1 role, I had to be a real leader for us, for our team, and just stepping into that role, I know I need to mature as a person, as a player too. And the person that I am now and the player that I am now has improved drastically from where I was in that bowl game.” 

Although Arnold will eventually learn from experience throughout OU’s season, his teammates are trying to prepare their young quarterback before the Sooners even take the field in their season opener against Temple on Friday, Aug. 30. Help for the rookie quarterback has come through advice from those who already have that experience Arnold will soon gain, or as simple as trying to make sure Arnold has as much time as possible to make decisions from the pocket. 

“He’s a dude,” tight end Jake Roberts said. “He can sling it, for sure. It’s been great working with him. Being a younger guy, too, I feel like I’m able to help him with some of the experience side of things, playing a lot of football. He’s got the talent, obviously, and I just try to help him out when I can, but he’s great. It’s been great working with him.”

This offseason, Roberts transferred to OU with exposure to 49 games in four seasons with now three different programs after joining the Sooners. More over, he started his career at North Texas, where he played under OU offensive coordinator Seth Littrell, who was the Mean Green’s head coach at the time. 

Roberts played under Littrell for three seasons, then left for Baylor when Littrell was fired and went to OU as an offensive analyst. Roberts started 22 games for Littrell after immediately seeing the field as a freshman in 2020, a year in which Arnold was still a sophomore backup down the road at Guyer High School in Denton, TX. 

“That experience, you can tell Jake’s played ball,” Arnold said. “Alongside that, he’s played with Coach Littrell, too. He knows how Coach Littrell operates, what he wants in the offense. So going out and running it and executing those plays that he’s known how to do has been big for us. And even teaching those young guys how those plays are supposed to be run.” 

Like Roberts, offensive lineman Febechi Nwaiwu also eventually followed Littrell from Denton to Norman. Nwaiwu was at UNT for three years before transferring this past offseason. He played for Littrell two of those seasons, however, he redshirted his first year on campus in 2021. Once he got on the field as a redshirt freshman, Nwaiwu was named a second-team Freshman All-American by The Athletic and third-team Freshman All-American by College Football News after starting 12 of 14 games. His production dipped last season with Littrell gone, starting seven games and missing two because of injury. 

“We want all of our quarterbacks to feel like they’ve got all the time in the world, especially Jackson,” Nwaiwu said. “We want him to be back there and be able to set the ball down and take a drink if he has to. We want him to have all of his options available, whoever he wants to throw to. Just give him enough time to punch it in there.” 

So far, Arnold has gotten by with a little help from his friends.

Already during fall camp, OU coach Brent Venables noted Arnold’s improved decision-making and running back Jovantae Barnes praised Arnold’s growth as a leader. 

“Jackson understands better than anybody what goes into being a quarterback of a football team,” Venebles said, “of the locker room, the leader, the face, the responsibilities, the challenges.”

Oklahoma wide receiver Jayden Gibson is expected to miss the 2024 season after suffering a significant knee injury during a fall camp practice last week, Sooners coach Brent Venables confirmed Tuesday afternoon.

Gibson, a junior from Winter Garden, Florida, was viewed as a potential breakout star for Oklahoma in 2024 after he caught 14 passes for 375 yards and five touchdowns as a sophomore last fall. The 6-foot-5 pass catcher injured his knee in practice last Tuesday, and a subsequent MRI revealed damage that will keep Gibson on the sidelines for Oklahoma’s debut SEC campaign this fall.

“You hate that for anybody, the season comes to an end prematurely,” Venables told reporters Tuesday. “But that’s a group that we feel really good about who’s in that group.”

Gibson joined the Sooners in the 2022 class as the No. 274 prospect in the ESPN 300 and No. 36 wide receiver in the nation. He flashed promise for the 2024 season in the late stages of his sophomore year last fall, tallying six catches for 196 yards and three touchdowns over Oklahoma’s final three regular-season games.

Gibson’s injury comes at a position of depth for the Sooners in a unit expected to be led by Purdue transfer Deion Burks. The 5-foot-9 junior caught 47 passes for 629 yards with seven touchdowns for the Boilermakers last fall and headlines a talented group of Oklahoma pass catchers that returns Jalil Farooq (45 catches, 692 yards), Nic Anderson (38 catches, 798 yards, 10 touchdowns), Andrel Anthony (27 catches, 429 yards before a season-ending knee injury) and Brenen Thompson (seven catches, 421 yards) in 2024.

Oklahoma opens Venables’ third season at home against Temple on Aug. 30 as the 16th-ranked team in the Associated Press Preseason Poll.

TULSA, Okla. — With thousands of kids headed back to class some state lawmakers are frustrated that every school won’t have emergency inhalers as those funds stalled in the Oklahoma State Department of Education.

The lawmakers said they approved the money to cover the cost of emergency inhalers for all Oklahoma public schools. It was sent to Governor Stitt’s office where he signed it into law.

But since then it’s struggled to actually go anywhere. For one Oklahoma family, it’s personal.

“Brendon was just an overall awesome kid. He grew up in Perry Oklahoma a small town. Loved sports, loved his faith and his family, but he tragically passed away at the age of 16 years old of an asthma attack,” said Brendon McLarty’s aunt Jennifer Blair.

She is also the executive director of the Brendon McLarty Memorial Foundation which helped sponsor the legislation.

“The lives and the hearts that have been affected as a result of something that we can fix. That we have funded that we have the ability to make these inhalers available so when these episodes happen,” said State Senator Chuck Hall.

He is one of the Oklahoma lawmakers trying to put inhalers in public schools with the help of the Brendon McLarty Memorial Foundation.

But the $250,000 allocated to the foundation stalled in the state Department of Education.

2 News talked to one of the bill’s authors Representative Mickey Dollens (D-Oklahoma City).

“Unreasonable for the Department of Education to hold up this money. Especially now that schools are going back into the classroom and that kids need this medicine without notice it needs to be on hand,” said Dollens.

After the bill was drafted it gained bipartisan support.

That approved the appropriation of a quarter of a million dollars to be given to the Brendon McLarty Foundation through OSDE.
However, that money was never distributed. Blair is not sure why the funds are being held.

“I honestly don’t know. We’ve been doing this for five years now. Providing inhalers, providing education, and out program really works. I mean last school year our inhalers were used 2,800 times in one school year,” said Blair.

In a letter to Attorney General Genter Drummond, State Superintendent Ryan Walters said he wants some clarity on distributing the funds.

Including whether to give the money all at once or in installments.

Walters also questions whether the legislature is favoring the Brendon McLarty Memorial Foundation over that of others.

Because he said the state can’t give any vendor preferential treatment.

LETTER TO AG DRUMMOND:

Oklahoma State Department of Education

Representative Dollens wasn’t surprised by the delay.

“They’ve had nine months, but this is a pattern of repeated behavior. Slow-playing elected officials not fulfilling grants. Not appropriating dollars where they should go. And it’s just an ongoing dysfunction that we’ve experienced unfortunately with the department of education,” said Rep. Dollens.

Blair hopes they get everything sorted out quickly and that no family has to lose their kid like they lost Brendon.

“I mean it’s been an honor to carry on Brendon’s legacy and to raise awareness about asthma,” said Blair.

2 News will continue to follow this story as it develops.

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