Greg McElroy evaluates Brent Venables comment on adjusting to SEC

Brent Venables knows Oklahoma‘s transition into the SEC won’t be easy. At the 2024 SEC Media Days, the Sooners’ head coach revealed his team’s mindset ahead of its debut campaign in the prestigious conference.

“You’re not going to sneak up anywhere, any week, in any venue, and show up and luck up and win,” Venables said. “It’s a conference that’s about earning what you get, and I think going through a season, you’ll figure that out.

“You’ll figure out what was good, what wasn’t good. The areas of your program, your roster that needs improvement so that you can match up and have an opportunity to compete for championships.”

ESPN’s Greg McElroy couldn’t agree more. On Thursday, the college football analyst praised Venables for his honesty and echoed the 53-year-old head coach’s sentiment.

“Truth,” McElroy said. “We’ve seen Oklahoma in the past. We’ve seen them play in playoff settings. Those rosters — created several years ago were not competitive enough in the trenches to compete with teams like Georgia, Alabama, LSU, what have you.

“I think that they have done their best to try to get bigger, stouter, more physical in the trenches, defensively. But, you don’t know if you’ve done it until you’ve actually gone through the test that is the season.”

Oklahoma’s defensive front held strong last season. The unit only allowed 138.6 rushing yards per game, ranking No. 42 in the country. Moreover, the Sooners boasted 98 tackles for loss, the seventh-most in the nation.

Nonetheless, Oklahoma won’t be facing Big 12 offensive lines in the upcoming season. Instead, the Sooners will face teams such as Tennessee, Ole Miss and Alabama. McElroy isn’t sure what to expect from the Sooners against such stiff competition.

“There’s a possibility that they come in and they’re great,” McElroy said. “But, there also is a possibility that there’s a learning curve, and they get exposed a time or two along the line of scrimmage because they have a lot of athleticism defensively, but are they bulky enough to hold up against teams that want to impose their will on the ground and try to take over the game from a physical standpoint?

“I think [Venables is] 100% accurate. You don’t really know what you got until you go and try to test yourself against the best. And they’re going to have that opportunity with the schedule that they play.”

Brent Venables and Co. will kick off their 2024 campaign against Temple on Aug. 30. The game will be broadcast on ESPN.