{"id":147972,"date":"2025-08-15T14:03:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T14:03:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/147972\/"},"modified":"2025-08-15T14:03:14","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T14:03:14","slug":"joel-klatt-on-oklahoma-sooners-2025-college-football-playoff-hopes-i-cant-in-good-conscience-pick-them-nfl-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/147972\/","title":{"rendered":"Joel Klatt on Oklahoma Sooners\u2019 2025 College Football Playoff hopes: \u201cI can\u2019t, in good conscience, pick them\u201d | NFL News"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"JoelBrent Venables returns to calling defensive plays for the Oklahoma Sooners in the 2025 season. FOX Sports analyst and former quarterback of the Colorado Buffaloes, Joel Klatt, sees Oklahoma Sooners as one of college football\u2019s biggest wild cards in 2025. With a revamped offense and a proven defensive mind taking over again, the Sooners look stronger on paper. But as much as Klatt likes the pieces in Norman, he\u2019s not convinced they\u2019re set for a College Football Playoff run \u2013 and the schedule is his main concern. Klatt ranked Oklahoma No. 24 in his preseason Top 25 and recently broke down his reasoning on The Joel Klatt Show, where he called OU a potential playoff sleeper \u2013 with a major \u201cbut.\u201d<\/p>\n

Offensive changes give Oklahoma Sooners a real upside this fall<\/p>\n

Joel Klatt\u2019s optimism starts with the offensive overhaul. After one of the worst scoring outputs in the SEC last year, the Sooners are turning to former Washington State QB John Mateer and his OC Ben Arbuckle to fix it. “I love the additions on offense. John Mateer is a guy I\u2019m very impressed with. I\u2019ve talked about him at length this offseason. (Ben) Arbuckle, his offensive coordinator at Washington State, also joins him in Norman there. Their offense should be better. It was bad last year. The film was some of the worst that I\u2019ve ever seen, to be honest with you,” Klatt said.Oklahoma\u2019s offense struggled badly last season, averaging just 13 points per SEC game without help from the defense and ranking 97th nationally. New quarterback John Mateer doesn\u2019t need to match the 4,000 yards and 44 touchdowns he had at Washington State, but even coming close would be a big upgrade. The Sooners also brought in star running back Jaydn Ott, new playmakers at receiver and tight end and experienced linemen to help fix a weak offensive line.<\/p>\n

Brent Venables is back in charge of the defense and Klatt thinks that\u2019s a good thing<\/p>\n

On defense, Brent Venables is calling the shots again. “Defense improved. The defense has steadily improved. Venables will be the play-caller on the defensive side for OU this year. I like that. I really like that. He\u2019s entering his fourth season. We\u2019ve seen them have a double-digit win season under Venables. So, can it happen? Absolutely,” Klatt said. After a year with Zac Alley as defensive coordinator, Venables is taking over play-calling again following Alley\u2019s departure.<\/p>\n

The brutal SEC schedule is the big concern<\/p>\n

Even with improvement on both sides, Klatt isn\u2019t predicting a playoff run \u2013 and he is clear why. “Here\u2019s the problem. If they had a more favorable schedule, like Auburn\u2019s? I think I would probably pick them (as a CFP sleeper) right here,” Klatt said. “But I can\u2019t, in good conscience, pick them with what their schedule is… They\u2019re not making this jump… I don\u2019t like it… While I think they can improve, I don\u2019t think they\u2019ll make enough of an improvement, as it relates to their schedule, which we don\u2019t talk about enough, to go to the playoff.”OU faces Michigan early, then battles through Texas, Alabama, LSU, Tennessee, Auburn, Ole Miss, Missouri, and South Carolina. Even a much-improved roster will struggle to navigate that slate.Also read: Travis Kelce breaks massive podcast record as Taylor Swift makes surprise appearance on New Heights<\/a>There\u2019s real excitement around Oklahoma\u2019s offseason moves. But unless they can break through one of the toughest schedules in the country, a return to the CFP will remain just out of reach.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Brent Venables returns to calling defensive plays for the Oklahoma Sooners in the 2025 season. FOX Sports analyst…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":147973,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[87290,21289,1361,1318,87289,48425,1317,1315,1316,21286,75667,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-147972","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-ben-arbuckle","9":"tag-brent-venables","10":"tag-college-football-playoff","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-joel-klatt","13":"tag-john-mateer","14":"tag-ncaa","15":"tag-ncaa-football","16":"tag-ncaafootball","17":"tag-oklahoma-sooners","18":"tag-sec-schedule","19":"tag-sports","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-unitedstates","22":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115033159066559516","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147972"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147972\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}