For Oklahoma quarterback John Mateer, the pressure is real as the Sooners prepare to travel to Sanford Stadium to face Kirby Smart and the Georgia Bulldogs. After back-to-back sluggish offensive performances, Mateer is running out of time to fix his mistakes. Before he can worry about silencing outside critics, he has to prove to head coach Brent Venables that his costly turnovers will not follow him into SEC play.

While winning every game has been the goal, the 2-1, 0-0 SEC Oklahoma Sooners’ offense and Mateer’s biggest early-season test is scheduled in Week 4. Kirby Smart’s Bulldogs (3-0, 1-0 SEC) are coming off a blowout away win over the Arkansas Razorbacks. On the flip side, the Sooners struggled to scrape by and win against New Mexico at home. Mateer’s next performance must prove he has introspected, as it will define the trajectory for the rest of the season. 

“It’s bad football,” Venables told Toby Roland. “It’s hard to win when you’re doing that to yourself. So, we’ve got to figure out how we’re not losing to Oklahoma.”

In Saturday night’s 14-6 victory, the problem that has consistently plagued Mateer was on full display. He threw two interceptions, and the offense gave away three first-half turnovers. He explained that the first interception happened because he forced the ball back to the middle. The second one was a result of miscommunication. 

Mateer completely took responsibility for his shortcomings rather than passing the blame. “It’s on me,” he said. “I mean, you just can’t do it. Other than that, I thought it was pretty good.” 

These turnover troubles are not a new headache for Mateer. Back during his days at Washington State, forced passes into tight zone coverage occasionally derailed his drives, a habit that popped up again during Oklahoma’s Week 2 clash with Michigan.

For Venables, managing erratic quarterback play brings back memories of past offensive slumps, making him even less tolerant of forced throws when heading into a brutal SEC environment.

The senior, however, also highlighted that his performance tried to make the best of what he had. He pointed to his completion rate: 17 out of 33, i.e., 62.7 percent; 652 passing yards for six passing touchdowns that he ended the game with.

The looming danger against Georgia’s secondary

Venables knows that while a sloppy performance against New Mexico still resulted in a win, repeating those same blunders against Georgia will lead to a total blowout. Kirby Smart builds his entire defensive game plan around punishing hesitant quarterbacks who throw late over the middle.

Venables made it clear to Mateer that if he does not clean up his decision-making right now, Georgia’s elite secondary will turn those exact mistakes into rapid points on the scoreboard.

“Again, we can’t throw it to them ever. And sometimes you’re going to get, ‘I don’t think that on either one of those that happened.’ But that we did give up the pressure on the first third down on a simple little single backer plug stunt,” he further added. 

Venables took a gamble by rearranging the offense after picking Mateer as his starter, who had injured his thumb. He brought in new faces from the transfer portal, re-assigned the offensive line, and made a game plan where multiple tight ends run simultaneously. All that for the QB to disappoint against Michigan in Week 2. 

“We can’t give up the pressure. John moves off the spot and tries to poke one in the hole and threw it late in zone coverage, and the guy was open initially, and the guy stepped, slid underneath the route and put us in a really tough position defensively by doing that, and the field position piece too, but the defense responded.”

Mateer’s one of the handful of explosive plays came when he found Isiah Satenga for a long touchdown. Midway through the third quarter, the quarterback found the wide receiver on a 53-yard pass to extend the 7-6 lead to eight points. 

“I kinda heard everybody screaming,” Mateer said about the TD. “And then I’m like, ‘Well, you know, something must be going on,’ and I see Isaiah puts his hand up.”

Mateer is self-aware of his shortcomings and knows the offense has to be better than what it is. That, however, is not an excuse to harass the team online. Mateer drew an unyielding line against criticism and bullying. “It’s not like you don’t need to boo us. Sure, do it. You can do whatever you want,” Mateer said. “But we’re people too.”