OU never closed door on Stogner
Oklahoma head coach Brent Venables and offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby remember it well when it comes to their first conversation with tight end Austin Stogner.
Stogner was coming off an underwhelming junior season at OU with 14 catches for 166 yards and three touchdowns.
Venables and Lebby were trying to take stock of who would be in Norman and who would be out the door. It did not take long to know about Stogner.
“I met Austin maybe my second or third day here,” Venables said. “He just wanted to shake my hand and tell me he was gone. He had already made that decision. Once I realized it didn't matter what I had to say, it was just something he felt he needed and wanted to do. I wished him well."
It was Lebby’s first day on the job when he had the same interaction with Stogner. The prized tight end recruit for the 2019 class was headed elsewhere.
Hard to blame Stogner. It was a tumultuous time, to say the least, following the 2021 regular season. Add in the chaos of the coaching changes with Stogner not being particularly used all that much anyway, the writing was on the wall.
“When I left, it was so crazy,” Stogner said. “Everything kind of hit the fan and I just tried to make the best decision for me and I thought that was me leaving.”
Stogner went to a familiar face, going to South Carolina and being reunited with head coach Shane Beamer, who had coached tight ends at OU during Stogner’s first years.
Stogner is appreciative of his one season with the Gamecocks, but that didn’t exactly go as planned, either. He finished with 20 receptions for 210 yards and one score.
With the COVID-19 option year available to him, Stogner decided why not take another crack at coming to Norman?
But it wasn’t Venables who was his first call. It wasn’t even tight ends coach Joe Jon Finley. Nope, Stogner went to Tanner Schafer, a former OU quarterback who is now a graduate assistant with the Sooners.
“I used to live with him and he’s a coach now,” Stogner said. “So I called him and I was like ‘Hey, can you talk to them? I want to come back.’ So that’s how it went from there. I was just hoping they’d say yes.”
Venables and Lebby did.
“If they said no, it would have been a little awkward,” Stogner joked.
It made sense for all parties involved. OU was going to be a little thin at tight end, especially in the experience department. No more Brayden Willis or Daniel Parker, so OU was going to find someone via the portal.
Stogner admitted he watched as many OU games as he could in 2022, and there’s no doubt he saw what Lebby and quarterback Dillon Gabriel were able to do with tight end Brayden Willis.
Willis, like Stogner, had the COVID option and returned to OU for his fifth year last season. Willis made the most of it and has now been invited to the NFL Draft Combine.
“I think he’s in a comfortable place,” Venables said. “I think he enjoyed his time at South Carolina. And maybe something that he needed in that time of his life. But also, I think it gave him an opportunity to have the right perspective about this opportunity here at the University of Oklahoma.
“And being close with his family and having an opportunity to be in this type of system in the use of our tight ends. He’s a worker. He’s a tough guy. He’s got a lot of juice and energy when it comes to competing.”
A fresh start and ready to roll. Stogner admits he was in a bad mental state when he finished his initial stint at OU. He knows that physically and mentally he’s in a much better frame of mind.
One year to make it happen. No doubt it was time to come home.
“Coming back, I wanted to play another year,” Stogner said. “I didn’t want it to be 40 years looking back wishing I’d had played another season of football in a place that I love and that’s coming back here.
“Once (OU was an option), I didn’t talk to anybody in the portal. I didn’t text anybody back. Colorado, West Virginia. Ole Miss. SMU. I just wanted to be here.”