If Oklahoma was going to beat Alabama football, it had to stop Jalen Milroe. After the Crimson Tide quarterback torched LSU with his legs two weeks ago, the Sooners, who entered Saturday’s game just 1-5 in SEC play, thought they had a plan.

On Alabama’s first play from scrimmage, Milroe went up the middle on a play that worked all night against the Tigers. Nothing doing here, Sooner linebacker Danny Stutsman, cowboy collar and all, put the redshirt junior on the ground, setting the tone for what was to come.

“Everyone’s saying he’s a huge duty, it’s hard to get him down,” Stutsman said afterward. “But you’re gonna go out there and start the game off like that, let them know he’s just another player. Obviously he’s a great player, but we had a good game plan.”

Milroe never got going for Alabama on Saturday. He finished with seven rushing yards.

With Oklahoma giving him nothing in the run game, he tried to pass. Milroe made several nice plays through the air, but no where near enough to make up for his three interceptions, including a pick six that took the air out of UA’s comeback attempt.

Sooner head coach Brett Venables praised his staff’s planning for Milroe.

“It’s hard to explain,” Venables said when asked how OU stopped Alabama’s quarterback. “Just discipline and physicality. There’s a timeliness to it. There’s how we defended several of the runs, there was a little bit of deception, and the players executed at an incredibly high level. The staff did a fantastic job of putting together a bulletproof plan and having answers.

“There’s a level of anticipation. ‘Hey, when we show this, they’re going to do that. When we do this, here would be their counter.’ And then the players played with great aggressiveness and anticipation, because I felt like they had another great week of preparation.”

Milroe himself praised the the Sooner defense after the game.

“They’re a really good defense,” Milroe said. “I thought they played really hard. They have a lot of guys that are physical, play really strong. And then, of course, when you play Alabama, you want to be at your best, especially here at home.”

Oklahoma certainly was, from staff to the players on the field. The Crimson Tide had no answer for what the Sooner defense threw at it, finishing with a mere three points.

According to Stutsman, it all came back to stopping Milroe and receiver Ryan Williams.

“We know everything goes through (Williams) and obviously the quarterback,” Stutsman said. “And we had an excellent game plan. We spent a lot of time just executing, trying to get everything down to the exact detail, and everyone did their job.”