By Paul Finebaum went after Oklahoma athletic director Roger Denny on SEC Network on Saturday morning, hours after Denny publicly objected to the SEC moving the Sooners’ game against the Ole Miss Rebels to Sunday.
Speaking with Matt Barrie, Finebaum defended Commissioner Greg Sankey and then turned the conversation toward Denny’s first year in charge in Norman.
Denny’s statement, posted around midnight, said Sankey moved the game over Oklahoma’s strong objection and warned that refusing to play at the new time would mean a forfeit.
“First of all, I understand the frustration, and none of us really know what happened to Ole Miss, but I believe the administration at Ole Miss did everything they could. What I don’t think is correct is Roger Denny, the athletic director there, pathetically pandering to his fan base at midnight to try to cover up whatever, I don’t know. But Mr. Sankey, the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference, made a decision for the entire conference and for the safety of everyone. He’s not concerned about what you’re doing with your fan base, and what Roger Denny has been doing all year is pandering to his fan base. Before the season, Matt, he gave his football coach Brent Venables a contract extension. They were ranked number nine in the country. They have now lost four games and are out of the playoffs. Why did he do that? Because he’s an impulsive leader. He’s a former tax attorney. I’m not castigating tax attorneys or attorneys in general, but they run differently. And what he did here is really against the code of the SEC, to call out a commissioner during a national crisis and emergency. He’s thinking about himself and his fan base, who was already on tenterhooks because of the season, and I think he is dead wrong. And quite frankly, I think it’s unbecoming of a leader in college athletics or anywhere to do what he did,” Finebaum said.
Paul Finebaum criticized Oklahoma AD Roger Denny for a midnight statement where he blasted the SEC’s decision to move the Ole Miss game to Sunday. https://t.co/MOmFA4SGk2
— Sports Fountain (@sportfountain) November 14, 2026
Denny announced Venables’ two-year extension on Aug. 20, two weeks before the opener, with Oklahoma ranked No. 9 in the preseason coaches poll and No. 10 by the AP. The new six-year contract runs through 2031 and is worth about $63 million. The Sooners take a 5-4 record into Sunday.
Denny is a tax lawyer by training who spent nearly 15 years as a corporate attorney before moving into athletics administration at Illinois, and he took over at Oklahoma in February.
When Paul Finebaum started questioning Roger Denny’s judgment
Finebaum first tied Venables’ struggles to Denny in late September. After Oklahoma lost at Georgia, he went on The Matt Barrie Show and put the extension squarely on the athletic director.
“You’re stuck with him because your AD, Roger Denny, decided to extend him for no reason at all,” Finebaum said, as Sooners Roundtable reported.
He went further after South Carolina won 42-25 in Norman.
“I am going to tell you right now: Brent Venables is dead. He is not getting back. He is out of ammunition. This has been an abject disaster for him, and unfortunately for Oklahoma fans, they are stuck with him,” Finebaum said, in comments Saturday Down South published.
The Rebels were unable to depart until after 5 p.m. ET on Saturday due to charter and pilot issues. Auburn, grounded on the same Friday, bused to Mississippi State for a kickoff pushed back four hours, the kind of workaround Denny’s statement pointed to.
Former Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops took Denny’s side Saturday morning, calling Sankey’s decision absolutely wrong in a post on X.
“All of the power 4 teams found a way to make it to their games, but Ole Miss wouldn’t,” Stoops wrote.
This decision by Greg Sankey is absolutely wrong. All of the power 4 teams found a way to make it to their games, but Ole Miss wouldn’t
ASU is flying across country to UCF this AM to play today. Greg Sankey instead of telling OU they would forfeit if they didn’t change the day, he could have told Ole Miss they will forfeit if they didn’t find a way to Norman even if game is delayed. But instead he didn’t!!
— Bob Stoops (@CoachBobStoops) November 14, 2026
Oklahoma and No. 19 Ole Miss kick off at 1 p.m. ET on Sunday in Norman, with the game airing on SEC Network.
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