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Oklahoma

Good to great, good to great – it is something OU head coach Brent Venables has been preaching about since the end of the 2025 season.  He knows

Oklahoma football's Danny Okoye blitzes freshman QB Bowe Bentley during OU's spring game April 18, 2026. Photo by Carey Murdock/Sooner Scoop

Danny Okoye

Sooner Scoop Football

Sooner Scoop

How OU football is attacking its biggest challenge for 2026

Under the stewardship of Todd Bates Oklahoma's defensive line room has become one of the most consistent units in college football. 2026 has,

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Sooner Scoop Football Recruiting

Oklahoma Football Focus: Defensive Line Has Stars and Questions

Between my 7,000 word Sooners' spring offensive intel writeup to go with scrimmage notes, plus,  Parker's spring scrimmage intel, you would be hard

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OUInsider

SOONERS SPRING DEFENSIVE INTEL: Can 2026 Defense Be Close to 2025 Version? | Position Breakdowns | Standouts | More

Watching the initial drills at OU spring practice at defensive tackle, and, wait, that is Nigel Smith and Trent Wilson?  Yep, it is a different day

Nigel Smith

Nigel Smith, other young OU defensive tackles with big opportunities

It's not every team who can lose a pair of draft picks in a position group and possibly be improved the following year. But that's a credit to the

Syndication: The Oklahoman

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Football

Nigel Smith II made a big impression early on in his high school career, especially since he arrived at Melissa (Texas) High School as a 6-foot-5, 250-pound 15-year-old freshman. “His dad is 6-9 and 280 pounds,” Melissa coach Matt Nally told Irish Sports Daily. “You think that his dad (former SMU basketball player Nigel Smith) could play for the Dallas Cowboys. He’s just a massive human being who is put together extremely well. But Nigel is a football player. You can't ask for a better kid as a player. His motor is unbelievable. He's just that prototypical coach's kid – works his butt off, gets up here before anybody else is up here, gets in a workout, goes through school and during the athletic period, works out again and then comes back and lifts after school. So, you just can't ask for a better kid in the situation that he is in. The work ethic that he has is just uncanny.” That work ethic helped Smith earn second-team Max Preps Junior All-American, Texas District 7-5A-II Defensive Lineman of the Year and Texas Sportswriters Association Class 5A first-team all-state honors in 2022. He was the Texas District 7-4A-I unanimous Defensive Lineman of the Year as a sophomore after being named the district’s newcomer of the year as a freshman. Smith enjoys playing basketball and gaming when he’s not involved with football.

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