{"id":1101,"date":"2026-09-22T18:10:05","date_gmt":"2026-09-22T22:10:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/dawg-sports-report-2026-09-22-evening\/"},"modified":"2026-09-22T18:10:05","modified_gmt":"2026-09-22T22:10:05","slug":"dawg-sports-report-2026-09-22-evening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/dawg-sports-report-2026-09-22-evening\/","title":{"rendered":"The Kind Words Came From the Wrong Sideline"},"content":{"rendered":"

Evening Edition \u2014 filed after the afternoon news cycle.<\/em><\/p>\n

GEORGIA MONEYBALL \u2014 Tuesday, September 22, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n

Oklahoma's quarterback got scolded by his own coach and praised by Kirby Smart in the same twenty-four hours, which tells you how the week is going in Norman.<\/strong><\/p>\n

ALBANY, GA \u2014 \u00b7 By the RFA Sports Desk<\/small><\/p>\n

Oklahoma comes to Athens on Saturday, and the roughest scouting report on the Sooners' quarterback did not come out of Georgia's film room. It came from Oklahoma's own head coach. After John Mateer threw two interceptions and his team coughed it up three times in the first half against New Mexico, Brent Venables told reporters that was 'bad football,' plain as a deacon reading the budget, and warned that doing it again against Georgia's secondary would cost him. When your own coach is handing out the bulletin-board material, the week is off to a peculiar start.<\/p>\n

The game that prompted all this candor was a 14 to 6 win over New Mexico, which is the kind of score you expect from two teams that lost the football and never found it. Oklahoma led 7 to 6 at halftime, at home, against an unranked opponent, and needed its defense to bail out the offense for a second straight Saturday. The Sooners have scored 24 points combined in their last two games. The bookmakers noticed, which is why Georgia opened at fourteen and a half.<\/p>\n

\n

The harshest thing said about John Mateer this week was said in Norman, and the nicest thing was said in Athens, by the man paid a fortune to beat him.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Meanwhile, over in Athens, Kirby Smart spent his Monday press conference saying Mateer 'pops out at you' on film and is hard to tackle, and praising Venables as one of the premier defensive minds in the game. So there you have it. The harshest thing said about John Mateer this week was said in Norman, and the nicest thing was said in Athens, by the man paid a fortune to beat him. College football remains the only business where the competition writes your recommendation letter.<\/p>\n

Oklahoma's troubles did not end at quarterback. Starting defensive tackle David Stone got hurt in Monday's practice, two days after leading the team with eight tackles and two tackles for loss, and the folks out in Norman say his availability for Athens is in doubt. Smart, for his part, said running back Nate Frazier is day to day but 'going to be fine' and expected to play. One team is getting healthier for Saturday. It is not the one riding the bus in.<\/p>\n

The game the whole country argued about over the weekend was down in Oxford, where Lane Kiffin walked back into Vaught-Hemingway wearing LSU purple and got beat by the program he left, 32 to 24. Ole Miss quarterback Trinidad Chambliss threw for 363 yards and two touchdowns and ran the tiebreaker in himself from 14 yards out, and Jaylon Braxton ended the argument with an interception in the end zone in the final minute. Revenge games are wonderful theater right up until the revenge goes the other direction.<\/p>\n

So Saturday it is, 3:30 Eastern on the television, Sooners and Dawgs in Athens. Venables says his quarterback cannot keep giving the ball away and win. Smart says that quarterback is dangerous anyway. One of them is going to be proven right in front of ninety-some thousand witnesses, and if it is Venables, he will have the strange distinction of having called it first. Honesty is a virtue. It is just rarely a game plan.<\/p>\n

The Notebook<\/h3>\n
    \n
  • THE LINE:<\/strong> Georgia opened at fourteen and a half over Oklahoma, with the total around 47 and a half. The Sooners have scored 24 points combined in their last two games.<\/li>\n
  • UPSET OF THE WEEK:<\/strong> Kentucky 31, Texas A&M 21. The Wildcats owned the third quarter, and the Aggies fell from ninth to twenty-third \u2014 the hardest drop in the poll.<\/li>\n
  • FRIDAY NIGHT DAWGS:<\/strong> Five-star running back commit Kemon Spell, the top-ranked back in the country, ran in the winning touchdown in McKeesport's 21 to 18 victory over the weekend.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    Written in the tradition of Lewis Grizzard, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 1946\u20131994.<\/em><\/p>\n

    Hear the desk read tonights report on Radio Free Albany, WPFQ 96.7.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Evening Edition \u2014 filed after the afternoon news cycle. GEORGIA MONEYBALL \u2014 Tuesday, September 22, 2026 Oklahoma's quarterback got scolded by his own coach and praised by Kirby Smart in the same twenty-four hours, which tells you how the week is going in Norman. ALBANY, GA \u2014 \u00b7 By the RFA Sports Desk Oklahoma comes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":1100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-dawg-sports-report","category-georgia-moneyball","category-sports-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1101\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pretoriafieldsradio.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}