The Oklahoma Sooners' offense struggled again on Saturday against the New Mexico Lobos. The Sooners totaled under 300 yards of total offense and averaged just 1.9 yards per carry.
On top of that, quarterback John Mateer threw two interceptions. The first one happened on the first drive. The Sooners' offensive line failed to pick up a simple blitz, which moved Mateer off his spot. He then tried to fit the ball into a tight window, and it was intercepted.
On the second, the Lobos brought a blitz, and Oklahoma ran a screen to Isaiah Sategna on the right side of the field. But that was a decoy, as the play was designed for a swing pass to Xavier Robinson with Parker Livingstone blocking the defensive back. Instead, Brent Venables revealed a mental
error resulted in the play ending in a turnover.
"The other is a blitz reliever," Venables said. "We've got to execute. We had a mental error there. He doesn't get his head back. We have basically two-on-one; the receiver is blocking the defensive back, and the running back got to get his head back right now. There's no defender with him, and he's going to run for a little bit if we can cover up the corner. He doesn't turn around, and the ball goes right to them as a result."
The frustrating part is Oklahoma had a play designed to answer the pressure and appeared to have the numbers needed to create a positive play. The mistake prevented that from happening and gave New Mexico another takeaway. Oklahoma ultimately turned the ball over three times.
Those errors are particularly costly for an offense already struggling to sustain drives. Oklahoma's defense was good enough to hold New Mexico to six points, but the Sooners won't have the same margin for error this week when they travel to face the Georgia Bulldogs.
The New Mexico game showed that Oklahoma's offensive problems aren't limited to one position. The offensive line has to improve its communication, the running game has to become more effective and the quarterbacks and skill players have to eliminate mental mistakes.
Against Georgia, the Sooners will need all three areas to improve because giving away opportunities that were there could be the difference between staying in the game and falling behind early.
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This article originally appeared on Sooners Wire: Brent Venables explains the main issue on John Mateer's second INT
