Oklahoma-Houston Review: PFF Grades, Redshirt Report and More

Oklahoma coach Brent Venables said several times Saturday night that his team deserved to lose to Houston because of its performance. It was ugly, but the Sooners still prevailed 16-12 to improve to 2-0 on the young season. 

“Thankful for victory,” Venables said. “I appreciate our players – their strain and their fight until the end to figure out a way to win – but disappointed in a lot of things that we did today. We did enough things wrong where we deserved to lose and fortunate to find a way to win.” 

A look at the numbers reveal it was a disappointing win, if there is such a thing, for the Sooners, especially compared to Week 1. A close game meant less young players getting experience before SEC play starts and those opportunities dwindle significantly. And Pro Football Focus seemed to have agreed for the most part with Venable’s assessment. 

Here’s a look at some OU numbers – Pro Football Focus grades, snap counts and more – coming off the Sooners’ Week 2 win over former Big 12 foe Houston. 

Pro Football Focus

Pro Football Focus’ grading system doesn’t believe the Sooners’ offensive performance Saturday was all too different from Week 1 against Temple, which on the scoreboard was a 35-point difference, but six forced turnovers and great field position could get a lot of credit for last week’s offensive success. PFF gave the OU offense a grade of 62.8 for Week 2, compared to 64.5 the week before. The passing grade was actually exactly the same (71.4) even though Jackson Arnold had a 4-0 TD-INT ratio last week and 2-1 on Saturday night. 

Speaking of Arnold, just as the passing grade wasn’t much different, neither was his personally, according to PFF. After a 72.2 grade in his home debut, Arnold went down a tick with a 71.9 this week. His grade as a runner actually improved from 58.4 to 62.6. His passing grade dipped, though, from 74.7 to 71.4. 

Tight end Jake Roberts, who made his first start and recorded his first reception as a Sooner on Saturday night, has the best season PFF grade so far on offense at 86.9. He’s the only offensive player who has played in both games that has a grade higher than 80. The next is offensive lineman Michael Tarquin, also a transfer, at 78.2. 

With that grade in 113 snaps this season, Tarquin is fourth on the team and third on the o-line in snap count. Fellow offensive linemen Jacob Sexton and Febechi Nwaiwu have played more snaps than anyone on offense with 120 apiece. Arnold is third with 116 after not finishing Week 1’s blowout. 

Arnold, Sexton, Nwaiwu, Tarquin and Joshua Bates were the only players to play all 62 offensive snaps Saturday night. That’s a lot of snaps for four of your offensive linemen, though. 

Week 2 specifically, Roberts also had the best game grade – contributing to that top season grade – at 91.8. Tarquin was second with a 76.1. Although Arnold takes the brunt of a poor offensive performance, he actually had the third-best grade, according to PFF, with a 71.9. 

Deion Burks was the top-graded receiver and fourth offensive player at 67.6, according to PFF.

Playing 53 snaps, tight end Bauer Sharp received the worst grade on the offense with a 33.7, as the guy in front of him at tight end, Roberts, had the best offensive grade. 

Defensively, OU got a PFF grade of 75.2, a big drop from its 87.7 last week. However, Week 1 included six turnovers. 

Defensive back Robert Spears-Jennings, who had an intersection late in the game, was the highest-graded defender at 87.9 in 56 snaps, according to PFF. 

Fellow defensive back Billy Bowman Jr. led OU defenders in snap count at 66. The next highest was 61 from linebacker Danny Stutsman. Leaders on this defense, Bowman and Stustsman were given grades of 70.1 and 66.8, respectively. 

Kip Lewis, playing next to Stutsman at linebacker, had the worst grade at 53.5. 

Redshirt Report 

Of the 44 players who logged a snap Saturday night, according to PFF, eight were true freshmen. That included Jayden Jackson, David Stone, Reggie Powers III, Jaydan Hardy, Michael Boganowski, Eugene Brooks, Taylor Tatum and Zion Ragins. 

For all of them, it was their second appearance this season, meaning they’re now halfway to reaching their redshirt game total, not including postseason. 

Of those freshmen, Jackson had the highest PFF grade defensively at 62.4, while, offensively, Tatum received a 66.4, which was the fifth-best overall offensively.