While it wasn't perfect, the Oklahoma Sooners' defense played well against the Michigan Wolverines on Saturday. The Sooners defense held Michigan to just 17 points, but seven of those came after an interception set the Wolverines up inside the 10-yard line.
Oklahoma held Michigan to just 263 yards of total offense, including less than 100 in the second half. Outside of the lone second-half touchdown allowed due to the interception, the Sooners forced a punt on every drive in that half. That includes three-and-outs on four of the five drives that ended in a punt.
Head coach Brent Venables revealed he is pleased with the defensive performance.
"Defensively, top to bottom, played really well for most of the day," Venables said via Sooners Illustrated.
"Did some fantastic things. Need to create turnovers. But continued to get stop after stop, and as the game continued to go on, our guys continued to play better and better... really excited about the improvement that I saw with a number of guys."
Venables' biggest criticism of the unit was straightforward: Oklahoma needs to create more turnovers. The defense did enough to keep Michigan's offense in check, but the turnovers are what changed the game.
That makes the defensive performance both encouraging and frustrating. Oklahoma outgained Michigan 289-263 and held the Wolverines to 111 passing yards, yet the Sooners still left Ann Arbor with a loss because they couldn't consistently capitalize on their opportunities.
The encouraging part for Oklahoma is that the defense appears capable of keeping the team in games against quality opponents. Now, with New Mexico up next, the Sooners need to turn those stops into takeaways and eliminate the small mistakes that have surfaced early in the season.
The defense may have already shown it can carry Oklahoma through difficult stretches; the next step is giving the offense more opportunities to finish the job.
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This article originally appeared on Sooners Wire: Brent Venables reacts to the defensive performance against Michigan
