Mason Young
Tulsa World OU Sports Reporter
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NORMAN — It wasn’t certain that Jake Maikkula and Febechi Nwaiwu would play against Auburn after rolled ankles late in Oklahoma’s 42-3 win at Temple.
OU would’ve been in a dire situation if its starting center and right guard, respectively, weren’t available for the Sooners’ Southeastern Conference over.
But Maikkula and Nwaiwu weren’t going to let that happen. They gutted it out in the 24-17 win over the AU Tigers Saturday night, playing all 66 offensive snaps, per Pro Football Focus.
“Tough kids who are selfless and they want to play,” offensive coordinator Ben Arbuckle said. “They want to be there for their teammates and they were. They played their butt off all night.
“Huge shoutout to those guys up front. I’m so proud of them, just what the process took this week to get them ready to play and then them going out there and playing their butt off all night. I couldn’t be more proud of that group in particular.”
Left guard Heath Ozaeta and right tackle Derek Simmons also played every snap Saturday. They’re only slightly removed from missing the season opener due to injuries, but have stayed in good shape and gotten better week by week. Simmons’ 85.2 pass blocking grade on PFF’s scale of 0-100 was OU’s best against Auburn.
Here are more takeaways off the PFF snap counts, passing charts and performance grades from OU’s win over Auburn:
Breaking down John Mateer’s passing vs. Auburn
John Mateer continues to attack the middle of the field.
Against Auburn, the OU quarterback went 24-for-36 for 271 yards in total and he was 17-for-23 (73.9%) for 167 yards between the numbers.
The offensive line kept Mateer clean on 32 of his 41 dropbacks, a superb rate of 78%. Mateer went 24-for-30 (80%) for 258 yards with a clean pocket. On the nine dropbacks when he was pressured (22%), he was 1-for-7 (14.3%) for 10 yards.
Auburn only blitzed Mateer on 15 dropbacks (36.6%). He went 8-for-13 (61.5) for 87 yards when facing extra rushers. When not blitzed (63.4%), Mateer went 17-for-24 (70.8%) for 181 yards.
Mateer had an exceptional grade of 92.4 on passes more than 20 yards downfield. He was 4-for-7 for 108 yards on deep balls.
Grades of the game
Pro Football Focus assigns a number grade, with zero being awful and 100 being perfect, to every aspect of a football game. Here’s how the Sooners graded out versus Auburn:
Overall performance – 67.5
Offense – 62.8
Passing – 73.2
Pass blocking – 80.3
Receiving – 66.9
Running – 48.2
Run blocking – 47.0
Defense – 69.2
Run defense – 74.5
Tackling – 48.7
Pass rushing – 61.3
Coverage – 70.4
Special teams – Not available
Notes: OU’s overall performance and offense grades were its lowest of the season. But the Sooners were also playing their toughest opponent to date. As Brent Venables would say, football’s not always pretty and perfection isn’t required; it’s about being good in the right moments. That said, OU had its lowest running and run blocking grade of the year by far. The Sooners’ inability to run is a concerning trend that needs to be addressed. Their tackling also graded out worse than it has all season. Good thing for all those sacks.
Snap counts, individual grades and other observations
1. Tory Blaylock once again got the lion’s share of snaps at running back, playing 52 plays to 12 for Jovantae Barnes, three for Xavier Robinson and none for Jaydn Ott or Taylor Tatum. It didn’t amount to much though, as the Sooners ran for a season-low 32 yards.
2. Wideout Isaiah Sategna, who totaled nine catches for 127 yards and a touchdown, had OU’s highest overall offensive (78.4) and receiving (82.6) grades against Auburn.
3. Freshman offensive tackle Michael Fasusi tried to play versus Auburn, but only lasted nine snaps as he continues to be hobbled by an ankle injury he picked up versus Michigan. Fasusi did, however, have the second-highest pass blocking grade (78.3) before subbing out. There was little drop off after him, as his replacement, Logan Howland, scored a 77.0 in pass protection over 57 snaps.
4. Safety Peyton Bowen was the only OU defender who played all 69 snaps against Auburn. Bowen was the Sooners’ top defender overall (88.8) and their best cover guy (87.5).
5. Defensive tackle David Stone was Oklahoma’s best run defender (85.0) against Auburn, according to PFF.
mason.young@tulsaworld.com
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Mason Young
Tulsa World OU Sports Reporter
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