Nov. 8—When asked about the importance of Oklahoma’s final three regular season games, head coach Brent Venables pointed to the 199899 season.

That season, Venables’ first as an OU assistant, the Sooners entered their stretch run with a 6-3 record. They split their final two regular season games before narrowly falling to Ole Miss 27-25 in the Independence Bowl.

It wasn’t the way the Sooners wanted the season to end, but they built a solid foundation entering the offseason. The following year, the Sooners went 13-0 and won the national championship.

For Venables, this year’s Sooners (5-4, 2-4 Big 12) have the same opportunity entering the last three weeks of the season. But the focus can’t just be on wins and losses.

“It’s important to build momentum, to finish the season strong,” Venables said. “Give us a chance to go to a bowl game and build momentum into the offseason as well. That can be a real thing. It doesn’t have to be, but it can be a very real thing as you’re foundationally trying to do things the right way.”

“Even if you’re in a resultsdriven business, that’s not what it’s about to me, and to us, and I think to successful people — long term successful people — It’s about all the other stuff. The result is a byproduct of doing everything: being committed, doing all the work, persevering, overcoming, fighting through it, handling success, handling the failure, all of it.”

Building that foundation has to begin with consistency, Venables said, which the Sooners have struggled with during Big 12 play, particularly in their 38-35 loss to Baylor on Saturday.

Penalties again hurt the Sooners against the Bears, committing eight of them for 64 yards. A hands-to-theface penalty on the offensive line negated Dillon Gabriel’s scramble to the Baylor 7-yard line and forced Zach Schmit to kick a 55-yard field goal to end the half, which he missed. Isaiah Coe’s personal foul in the third quarter turned a third-and-13 into a first-and-goal for the Baylor offense, and the Bears scored a few plays later.

The Sooners are currently tied for the third-most penalties in the Big 12 and they lead the league in penalty yards.

“I think the biggest thing is being able to understand playing penalties and nonplaying penalties,” said Jeff Lebby, OU offensive coordinator. “Non-playing penalties are inexcusable. When you’re playing 75 plays a game and you are playing center and you are battling every single snap and your right hand slips high one time and you get a call? Those are things that happen in the flow of a football game that you don’t like, you don’t want and you are coaching to correct it constantly.”

“But the pre-snap penalties, the two false starts (we had), can’t be part of the game.”

The Sooners’ defense also struggled at times with lining up, and the Baylor offense took advantage. On Richard Reese’s two-yard touchdown in the third quarter, linebackers Jaren Kanak and Danny Stutsman both filled the same gap on the right side of the line of scrimmage, leaving a hole on the left side that Reese ran through.

“This is a game of performance, game of execution. Right now, we’re not executing consistently like we need to,” Venables said. “When we do, we’re in pretty good shape. When we get lined up, make the right adjustments and get our eyes where they belong, we’re pretty solid. When we don’t, we’ve been getting punished by good teams.”

Those are things the Sooners will need to improve through the rest of the season, and it starts this weekend with West Virginia. But the ultimate hope for Venables and the Sooners is that their performances will help establish much-needed consistency they can build on for the future.

“Developing a foundation of consistency is what it’s all about,” Venables said. “You don’t want to have a great year this year and then [in] two years [you] win two games. The best programs are ones that have sustainability and longevity, and consistency is what that’s all about. That’s the hardest thing.

“But looking again now to finish the year, now to going into the offseason the right way, I think it’s important that we continue to make incremental improvement and again focus on again the things that we can control.”