By: Jay Berry
Seth Littrell is out as the Oklahoma Sooners’ Offensive Coordinator.
They were coming off a 10-win 2023 season and entering Brent Venables’s third season as the head coach. Oklahoma fans were hopeful about the team’s first year in the SEC.
After seven games, the Sooners’ record is 4-3, and the wheels are falling off. The Sooner Schooner crash from a few years ago looks like the 2024 season. They went from the Lincoln Riley days to the complete opposite, and it’s much worse.
Scary scene early today in Norman as the Oklahoma Sooner Schooner overturned while taking a sharp turn during a touchdown celebration. pic.twitter.com/rk3gU89Jpw
— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) October 19, 2019
Fans have been screaming for Littrell to be fired, and they got their wish—something that had to be done.
“Seth is an all-time great Sooner,” Oklahoma coach Brent Venables said in a statement. “He has a deep love for this university and football program, and he has poured his heart and soul into both. Despite that, our performance as an offense this season has not at all lived up to the OU standard, and I felt a change was necessary now.”
More Sports News
It’s not all his fault, though. The injuries have left the team with few healthy offensive players who just aren’t good enough. The offensive line can’t block, and their starting receivers are all injured.
That said, every week had the same scheme and the same, at times, lazy play calling. As Venables said, the RPO can be too much for young players at that level. That’s especially true when your players are not good enough.
Joe Jon Finley will take over as the interim coordinator duties while analyst Kevin Johns, the former offensive coordinator at Duke, has been promoted to interim quarterbacks coach and co-offensive coordinator. Finley was the tight ends coach coming into this season. That position group has been very underwhelming this season. He was also the co-offensive coordinator this season.
Hopefully, this move will only be for the remainder of the season because Oklahoma desperately needs to do a genuine search for an offensive coordinator. They can’t just hire the guy down the hall again like they always seem to do, and what they did with Littrell.
The team is perceived to be heading in a disastrous direction. The program must retain committed recruits and prevent players from entering the transfer portal.
This season may very well end with a record of 5-7. Their roster has long-term consequences, so making this change at least gives a glimmer of hope that things will be much different offensively next year.
Maybe they can find a Zac Alley-type coordinator for the offense. A younger coach who relates to today’s players, has an innovative mindset, and has no ties to the school would be ideal.
The Sooners can’t afford to return to the John Blake days of 1996-1998 when the team won just 35% of their games or to Schnellberger’s 5-5-1 1995 season, or the Gary Gibbs era of 1989-1994. Those were mediocre times in the program’s history.
They’re no longer in the Big 12, playing as Dorothy and the Good Witch of the North. They’re in a conference where, every week, they play teams with bad intentions, like the Wicked Witch.
At this point in the season, with their current active roster, fans can only hope for the morale to stay positive and salvage whatever they can from the season. Then, they should make a big push in the off-season for an offensive coordinator and make sure they keep their committed recruits and active roster together.
Prior to this season, they showed interest in UNLV’s coordinator, Brennan Marion. Maybe they’ll take real action this time. There’s no doubt the next few months are going to be crucial for the health of the program.
The Sooners are back in action this Saturday at Ole Miss for a noon kickoff.