NORMAN — Four months ago, amid an offensive coordinator search that eventually led to Ben Arbuckle, OU football’s Brent Venables made it clear hiring coaches with Sooner ties wasn’t a necessity.
However, relationships are important to Venables and he’s never shied away from hiring former colleagues and friends.
“I could care less about OU ties,” Venables said then. “That doesn’t matter to me at all. I’ve hired some people that have OU ties and I’ve hired some people that have never been to the state of Oklahoma before.”
With that said, the Sooners‘ hiring of former OU offensive coordinator and Tulsa head coach Kevin Wilson as an offensive analyst is a no-brainer. Wilson, who was fired as the leader of the Golden Hurricane on Nov. 24, 2024, will reunite with Venables after the two worked together at OU from 2002-10, according to multiple reports.
Prior to his time at Tulsa, Wilson served as Ohio State’s offensive coordinator from 2017-22 and was Indiana’s head coach from 2011-16. Before OU, he called plays at Northwestern from 1999-2001 and at Miami (OH) from 1992-98. His other play-calling experience came at North Carolina A&T in 1988.
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Wilson’s hiring comes as OU aims to rebuild its offense after finishing 113th in total offensive yards in 2024.
He’ll bring a quantity of experience to an offense led by the 29-year-old Arbuckle. Wilson joins John Kuceyeski, who followed Arbuckle from Washington State and also joined the Sooners as an offensive assistant this offseason.
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