Grasping to a 27-21 lead with eight minutes left, Nick Foles threw a detrimental interception.
It was Sept. 18, 2010, when Foles and Arizona let a 27-14 lead slip to a tie in less than a minute against No. 9 Iowa. Before he knew it, Foles, then in his second season as a full-time college starter, was thrown back into the fire and completed 5-of-6 attempts for 76 yards and threw the game-winning touchdown the ensuing drive, with offensive coordinator Seth Littrell calling the plays.
The game plan on the final drive was good, but the belief Littrell instilled in Foles is what then-quarterbacks coach Frank Scelfo credits the heroics to.
“That epitomized so much about Seth and the belief that he had,” Scelfo said. “... They trusted him. He developed that relationship with them where they had a lot of faith in him, what he was doing and the direction he wanted to take things.”
Foles and Littrell went on to lead the No. 9 passing offense in the nation, a substantial jump from Foles’ first season with the Wildcats prior to Littrell’s arrival, when they ranked 48th. They upped themselves in 2011 by ranking third, and attempted less rushing attempts than all but three FBS teams.
A true Air Raid offense.
Over a decade later, the potential for a similar caliber passing attack follows Littrell to OU, where he’ll take rein of the offense for the Sooners (10-2, 7-2 Big 12) offense against Arizona (9-3, 7-2 Pac-12) in the Alamo Bowl at 8:15 p.m. Thursday in San Antonio before OU’s inaugural season in the SEC.
Though Littrell won’t tip his cap on what OU’s offense will look like in his first season as coordinator, his diverse background in play calling has aligned him to play to the Sooners’ strengths, rather than his own.
“Some of it’s going to fit your personality,” Littrell said Tuesday of his offensive scheme. “But a lot of it year to year is going to change depending on what you have, who’s the quarterback, who are your receivers, running backs, O-line. Every year is a little bit different.”
“I think it’s our job as coaches to put our players in the best situations to have success at whatever that is. That’s what (co-offensive coordinator Joe Jon Finley and I) need to do.”
Keeping with the theme of playing to their strengths, the Sooners are set to have junior Andrel Anthony, their leading receiver up until his season-ending injury against Texas, return alongside junior Jalil Farooq, who’s leaning toward returning for his senior season after recording a career-high 732 yards from scrimmage in 2023.
A young core of redshirt freshman Nic Anderson and sophomore Jayden Gibson, who combined for 1,097 receiving yards and 14 of OU’s 32 receiving touchdowns, along with Purdue transfer Deion Burks and four receivers from the 2024 class bolsters the depth and potential of the Sooners’ receiving room.
OU also added Southeastern Louisiana transfer Bauer Sharp and four-star tight end Davon Mitchell to revitalize a tight end room that recorded 252 yards in 2023, the lowest mark from the room since 2014.
As for quarterback, the Sooners have that covered with former five-star recruit and freshman Jackson Arnold, who will make his first college start in the Alamo Bowl.
“It’s been awesome,” Littrell said of his time working with Arnold. “Jackson is a phenomenal young man, extremely hard worker. He’s going to put in all the time it takes to prepare the right way each and every week, even though he wasn’t the starter most of those games this year. Like I told him, we’re both getting our first start together. It’ll be an amazing time. No one better to do it with.
“We’ve got great playmakers around us, great coaches around us that are going to make plays for us, too. Our job is to work as hard as we can, collaborate effort with everybody else, and do our job, make the plays and manage the game that we’re supposed to, and let the guys around us make huge plays for us, as well.”
OU’s potential for an air-raid offense is clear. The early season struggles it faced in the run game this season and hampered offensive line it takes into 2024 may force Littrell’s offense to be pass-dominant.
If that’s the case, he’ll be prepared.
Under Littrell’s guidance for two of his three seasons as a starter, Foles eventually became Arizona’s all-time leader in passing yards and touchdowns. The Sooners have those kinds of expectations for Arnold, and trust Littrell is the one to develop him best to reach his potential.
“It’s the confidence you can instill in your players, and the belief and trust you have in the back and forth relationship,” Scelfo said. “That’s Seth’s strong suit. That’s gonna happen. As a young kid like that coming in, and all the sudden you gotta take over that program, he’s (thinking), ‘Wow, this is big.’ (Seth is gonna say), ‘No, it’s not. It’s 100 yards just like it is everywhere else you’ve played. It’s gonna be fine.’ Then he’s going to decompress a little bit.
“The good thing is Seth has lived this process as a player, as a head coach, as a coordinator at a power five conference. So it’s not something that’s gonna be over his head, and he’s gonna be able to show the kids the same thing.”
OU football offensive line coach Bill Bedenbaugh during the Sooners' open practice on April 10.
Littrell will rely on his longtime friend and OU offensive line coach Bill Bedenbaugh, who served as co-offensive coordinator alongside Littrell in 2010 with the Wildcats.
“Those guys are best friends, man,” Scelfo said. “That thing went really smooth between those two guys. There was nothing there that caused any kind of friction or issues. They both understood the offense.”
Their tight relationship proved contagious to Arizona’s entire staff. Over a decade later, the relationship between Littrell and Bedenbaugh is one example of the cohesiveness head coach Brent Venables seemingly has at the forefront of his mind when making hires.
“They headed it up,” Scelfo said of the cohesiveness of the staff. “They were in front of the offense everyday. Seth took most of the control. Bill’s not that kind of guy that likes to do that. He had his offensive lineman, he had his deal with them, and Seth had most of the skill guys that he was (coaching). That was a very well-oiled machine when I got there, and it was like that for two seasons.”
The dynamic between the two is seemingly the same ahead of the Sooners’ upcoming season. Littrell has his skill players. The confidence surrounding Jackson Arnold is high, while the same can’t be said of the protection he’ll be granted from the Sooners’ offensive line.
The departure of all five starting offensive lineman from the 2023 squad, with freshman Cayden Green serving as the most surprising one, has left a void on an otherwise promising offense.
With Littrell, OU adds the element of play calls that cater to its strengths.
The Foles’ game-winning drive Littrell coordinated in 2010 gives hope to the Sooners, who came up short in similar situations in 2023. After OU’s defense forced its second turnover of the fourth quarter and positioned the offense to secure a 33-32 victory over Kansas with a first down, they failed on three consecutive run plays and couldn’t make magic happen in the last 42 seconds after the Jayhawks scored a go-ahead touchdown.
One week later, the Sooners completed a three-yard out route to redshirt senior wide receiver Drake Stoops on fourth-and-5, trailing Oklahoma State 27-24 with a minute left and ultimately losing after the turnover on downs.
Then-offensive coordinator Jeff Lebby was criticized for his play calling throughout the season, but none more than in two of the biggest games of the season and the crunch time moments within those games. Scelfo has full confidence in Littrell’s composure with the game on the line.
“(Bill and Seth) have a calm head about them, and the players will feel that,” Scelfo said. “... The end of the game has already been played out. We did that Monday through Friday, we just haven’t had the chance to run the plays yet. We’ll run them on gameday, and it’s matter of fact, the players know what they’re going to do, and I see that happening (at Oklahoma).
“I saw it at Arizona. We had a lot of close games there. We won some, we lost some, but there wasn’t a sense of panic with our players … that was where the leadership really started to show.”
The pieces are in place for OU to have a prolific air raid offense in 2024 with Littrell, who flourished in doing so at Arizona. Similar to his development of Foles, Scelfo is confident Littrell is the guy the Sooners want assisting Arnold in his first season as a starter.
The tools are set up for the Sooners’ offense, with Littrell seemingly the final piece to the puzzle.
“You never heard them flinch,” Scelfo said of Bedenbaugh and Littrell as co-offensive coordinators. “It was always, ‘We can do this.’ It was a can do, positive deal. … The confidence they had in what they were doing and what they believed in is what you really remember about their staff.”