Kirby Smart didn’t need long to figure out what Georgia was getting in Gentry Williams.
The former Oklahoma cornerback only just arrived in Athens after transferring over the offseason, but at SEC Media Days this week, Smart made it clear the Bulldogs targeted him for a reason. More than that, he used Williams as an opening to tip his cap to Brent Venables and the way Oklahoma develops defensive backs.
“When you take guys from a Brent Venables defense, you know what you're getting," Smart said. "You're getting a guy that understands leverages, coverages.
A lot of similarities to us defensively, teaching-wise. That's shown.
"(Williams has) played. He's got experience.
He's got plenty of experience. And that's what we were searching for: some guys that could be competitive, compete for starting jobs, come in and help us.
God forbid, you never know what kind of injuries you have during the year. You gotta have the ability to have six to seven defensive backs who've got play experience.
He's got that."
That kind of praise carries weight coming from the head coach of back-to-back SEC champion Georgia. It also says plenty about the reputation Venables has built with his defense, even as Oklahoma and Georgia have yet to meet since the Sooners joined the SEC.
Williams, a Booker T. Washington High School product from nearby Tulsa, signed with Oklahoma in 2022 as a four-star recruit and spent four seasons in Norman before leaving after last season.
He played in 30 games and made 15 starts for the Sooners, though injuries limited him over the last two years. While he was sidelined, Eli Bowen and Courtland Guillory locked down the cornerback spots, and both are back in 2026.
That development helped push Williams out, but it also highlights how strong Oklahoma’s young cornerback room became. Bowen and Guillory took control while Williams was unavailable, and Smart’s comments only reinforce how much value Georgia saw in a player who had already been through Venables’ system.
The transfer also came at a time when Oklahoma needed to rebuild its own depth. The Sooners lost four cornerbacks to the portal this offseason, leaving Jacobe Johnson - who has two career starts - as the only reserve corner with any real experience behind Bowen and Guillory.
Venables had to go shopping for help, too. Oklahoma added Prince Ijioma from Mississippi Valley State and Dakoda Fields from Oregon, while redshirt freshman Trystan Haynes remains in the mix and incoming freshman Derrick Johnson II is also part of the picture.
Even with those additions, landing a proven starter out of Venables’ defense the way Georgia did is not the norm. Oklahoma lost 10 defenders to the portal this offseason, but none were established starters in 2025. That leaves open the possibility that Venables’ entire starting defense in 2026 could be made up of players who have been at Oklahoma since high school.
For Venables, Smart’s comments are a compliment worth keeping. But they also underline something bigger: players notice that development, too. And if Oklahoma keeps producing defenders like that, other programs are going to keep coming after them.
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