In an ESPN+ story, Tom VanHaaren explored which college football teams lost the most in the transfer portal. Oklahoma was one of his 10 schools that lost the most in the portal and he explored how the Sooners replaced that talent with the portal.
Despite losing a handful of really talented football players to other programs, OU head football coach Brent Venables actually managed it well by adding players from the portal to offset those departures. In fact, just a few short weeks ago VanHaaren had Oklahoma at No. 5 on his list of college football teams that were most helped by the transfer portal.
Van Haaren wrote this about the players that OU saw depart through the transfer portal in his “who’s leaving” section of his breakdown.
The Sooners didn’t see the quantity of players leave as some of the others on the list, but there were plenty of contributors who left the program.
The biggest name was freshman quarterback Caleb Williams, who’d supplanted Spencer Rattler as starting quarterback. Williams joined Lincoln Riley at USC, as did receiver Mario Williams, who was also a freshman at Oklahoma this past season.
Rattler and tight end Austin Stogner both transferred to South Carolina, and receiver Jadon Haselwood left for Arkansas. Haselwood is a former five-star who led the Sooners in receiving touchdowns this past season with six. The staff also saw defensive back Latrell McCutchin follow Riley to USC. – VanHaaren, ESPN.
Now, to the part that should excite Oklahoma fans. VanHaaren was pretty positive about what the Sooners have added in his “who’s coming in” breakdown.
When the number of players transferring out was first reported, it looked almost insurmountable for the new staff to replace all the departures. But Brent Venables and the coaches have done an excellent job replacing key players.
Replacing…
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