After the USA loss I argued that firing Gundy and hiring someone better would be difficult because Gundy is a good coach and there are a lot fewer good coaches than there are are mediocre coaches and coaches that suck. How do we know Gundy is a good coach? Witness the past four weeks.
After the USA loss the season looked pretty dire. Our run of bowl games and winning seasons looked like it was pretty well over because it was difficult to see where six wins was going to come from. But a lot of coaching has been going on in Stillwater. This isn't the same team that lost to South Alabama. Not even close. I wish we could play them again. They do not want to play us again, at all. Neither does Iowa State for that matter.
Offense: A
I haven't even looked at the offensive statistics yet, and I don't care what they say, this was Bowman's best game. The goal-to-go touchdown he threw to Bray he threw into a window the size of a dishtowel, and he threw it through defensive linemen in his face which meant he had to change his arm angle to throw through a tiny throwing lane and hit the back half of the dishtowel. Oh my gawd what a great throw! Yeah, no, we normally think of throwing 35 yards downfield and dropping it down the chimney pipe as great throws... no, go back and watch the replay again and again and again. THAT was a great throw.
Early in the season I criticized Bowman for bailing from the pocket when he didn't need to and throwing off his back foot when he didn't need to. I can only remember once when he threw off his back foot yesterday and it was a completion. These things have been corrected. Once again, some coaching has been going on.
Bowman's numbers: 24/36 210 2 TDs 1 int, efficiency rating 128. Okay, so efficiency-wise his last game was better. I don't care. He was better this game. He just was. When we needed a play he got it.
In fact, it was that way with the offense this week. The past two weeks the defense has closed out the fourth quarter for us. This week we needed the offense to be explosive late to cover the defense. Check and check. Time and again. Boom. And guess who got the helmet sticker on College Football Final for the second week in a row?
It should be the o-line getting helmet stickers. No sacks. No holding penalties. No illegal procedures. For the second week in a row (maybe the third). Those are drive killers and our o-line has been nearly flawless. There is a reason why Bowman no longer is bailing from the pocket with the happy feet and that is because the pocket is staying intact. I know there has been a LOT of criticism of Dickey, but dadgum there has been a lot of coaching up our o-line in the past month and it is paying off. No sacks. No holding penalties. No illegal procedures. That's discipline, that's coaching. How many times did we see Gordon hit the second level yesterday before someone laid a finger on him? Come on now, even if you've been vocal in your criticism, it's time to give some due. And Dalton Cooper played the entire game yesterday, that made a difference too. We consistently found room to run off the left side. Coop is next level good.
Ollie Gordon... if he doesn't start getting mention for post-season awards then something is wrong. He is showing power, vision, patience, and speed. 282 and four touchdowns. Wow!
And I'll just mention, I continue to like our play calling. 8-14 on third downs is an improvement over the past two weeks, and I said that was something we needed to improve. It needs to continue to improve. 60-70% third down conversion is winning offensive football. Also, I'll mention, we were consistently picking up positive yardage on first down and staying ahead of the chains. There was only once that I can remember when we threw the ball needlessly 25 yards downfield for an incompletion when what we really needed was just to pick up a first down. And the interception was entirely forgivable. It didn't cost us, our defense got the stop, and absolutely no one was open on that play. It would have been better for Bowman to throw it away, but, eh.
Defense: C+
They were 8 of 15 on third downs and we let them out of several third and long or third and very long situations. Our inability to cover receivers and leave them wide open is maddening. On the other hand, we didn't give up much to their two running backs, we kind of forced their quarterback to beat us single-handedly, and eventually that broke down.
Kansas complained last week that on their last fourth down play that Collin Oliver was offside. It was very close, too close to call, which means he timed it perfectly. If their quarter back had varied his cadence a little he would have caught him. An experienced defender and an inexperienced quarterback. Well, Greene caught Oliver timing the cadence yesterday, which is what an experienced quarterback will do.
Once again, Nick Martin was all over the freaking field with 17 tackles. Please, someone buy him breakfast at Shortcakes this morning, full stack and an order of bacon and an order of sausage links. (Note: no longer an NCAA violation)
Overall, for a road game against a good team, not a bad effort. There were signs of improvement. But we only have two weeks to get much, much better on defense.
Points off turnovers
Oklahoma State: 17
West Virginia: 0
We turned the ball over for the first time since Ames, but we found a way for it not to hurt us.
Special teams: C+
I don't know what to say about special teams, this was a strange game. This was the first time in the past four games that we haven't clearly outplayed the other team ST-wise. The explanation that Dave and John gave on the missed field goal is that the college rule is that the ball has to be entirely inside the inside lining of the upright, where the NFL rule is that the ball has to be entirely within the outside lining of the upright, which means the ball can be over the upright and the kick can be good. I thought the kick was good. Hale thought the kick was good. I think most of West Virginia thought the kick was good. I thought their player shoved our player into Presley, which I thought was a violation of the fair catch rule, but then the exact same thing happened to them, so, college football karma. Nixon returned a kick out of the end zone and only got to the 17, what was he thinking? We let a short kickoff bounce instead of fair catching it. We roughed their place kicker. Like I said, very strange and uncharacteristic ST where our ST play has been excellent.
Coaches: A
Give the coaches their due. Look at that performance against South Alabama and then look at that performance yesterday. There has obviously been some coaching going on in between. There were rumors all over twitterX about players not wanting to play and wanting to leave and Gundy had lost the lockerroom. Does that look like a team that doesn't want to play for its coach? More than any other sport, football players have to believe in their coach in order to win. If they don't it won't look good. I'm telling you, this is a team that believes.
We are 5-2 and tied for second in the Big 12 with Iowa State, Texas, and Kansas State. A month ago this was unimaginable. Let's take care of business against 2-5, 0-4 Cincy and America's Biggest Homecoming. Ride with Pride! Go Pokes!
One last comment since I live in Michigan:
If Michigan was paying someone to watch Iowa's offense and steal signs, they should be fined by OSHA and not the NCAA. How many signals could there possibly be for "run it up the middle"? Why on earth would you need to steal the signs for "throw an incompletion"?
After the USA loss the season looked pretty dire. Our run of bowl games and winning seasons looked like it was pretty well over because it was difficult to see where six wins was going to come from. But a lot of coaching has been going on in Stillwater. This isn't the same team that lost to South Alabama. Not even close. I wish we could play them again. They do not want to play us again, at all. Neither does Iowa State for that matter.
Offense: A
I haven't even looked at the offensive statistics yet, and I don't care what they say, this was Bowman's best game. The goal-to-go touchdown he threw to Bray he threw into a window the size of a dishtowel, and he threw it through defensive linemen in his face which meant he had to change his arm angle to throw through a tiny throwing lane and hit the back half of the dishtowel. Oh my gawd what a great throw! Yeah, no, we normally think of throwing 35 yards downfield and dropping it down the chimney pipe as great throws... no, go back and watch the replay again and again and again. THAT was a great throw.
Early in the season I criticized Bowman for bailing from the pocket when he didn't need to and throwing off his back foot when he didn't need to. I can only remember once when he threw off his back foot yesterday and it was a completion. These things have been corrected. Once again, some coaching has been going on.
Bowman's numbers: 24/36 210 2 TDs 1 int, efficiency rating 128. Okay, so efficiency-wise his last game was better. I don't care. He was better this game. He just was. When we needed a play he got it.
In fact, it was that way with the offense this week. The past two weeks the defense has closed out the fourth quarter for us. This week we needed the offense to be explosive late to cover the defense. Check and check. Time and again. Boom. And guess who got the helmet sticker on College Football Final for the second week in a row?
It should be the o-line getting helmet stickers. No sacks. No holding penalties. No illegal procedures. For the second week in a row (maybe the third). Those are drive killers and our o-line has been nearly flawless. There is a reason why Bowman no longer is bailing from the pocket with the happy feet and that is because the pocket is staying intact. I know there has been a LOT of criticism of Dickey, but dadgum there has been a lot of coaching up our o-line in the past month and it is paying off. No sacks. No holding penalties. No illegal procedures. That's discipline, that's coaching. How many times did we see Gordon hit the second level yesterday before someone laid a finger on him? Come on now, even if you've been vocal in your criticism, it's time to give some due. And Dalton Cooper played the entire game yesterday, that made a difference too. We consistently found room to run off the left side. Coop is next level good.
Ollie Gordon... if he doesn't start getting mention for post-season awards then something is wrong. He is showing power, vision, patience, and speed. 282 and four touchdowns. Wow!
And I'll just mention, I continue to like our play calling. 8-14 on third downs is an improvement over the past two weeks, and I said that was something we needed to improve. It needs to continue to improve. 60-70% third down conversion is winning offensive football. Also, I'll mention, we were consistently picking up positive yardage on first down and staying ahead of the chains. There was only once that I can remember when we threw the ball needlessly 25 yards downfield for an incompletion when what we really needed was just to pick up a first down. And the interception was entirely forgivable. It didn't cost us, our defense got the stop, and absolutely no one was open on that play. It would have been better for Bowman to throw it away, but, eh.
Defense: C+
They were 8 of 15 on third downs and we let them out of several third and long or third and very long situations. Our inability to cover receivers and leave them wide open is maddening. On the other hand, we didn't give up much to their two running backs, we kind of forced their quarterback to beat us single-handedly, and eventually that broke down.
Kansas complained last week that on their last fourth down play that Collin Oliver was offside. It was very close, too close to call, which means he timed it perfectly. If their quarter back had varied his cadence a little he would have caught him. An experienced defender and an inexperienced quarterback. Well, Greene caught Oliver timing the cadence yesterday, which is what an experienced quarterback will do.
Once again, Nick Martin was all over the freaking field with 17 tackles. Please, someone buy him breakfast at Shortcakes this morning, full stack and an order of bacon and an order of sausage links. (Note: no longer an NCAA violation)
Overall, for a road game against a good team, not a bad effort. There were signs of improvement. But we only have two weeks to get much, much better on defense.
Points off turnovers
Oklahoma State: 17
West Virginia: 0
We turned the ball over for the first time since Ames, but we found a way for it not to hurt us.
Special teams: C+
I don't know what to say about special teams, this was a strange game. This was the first time in the past four games that we haven't clearly outplayed the other team ST-wise. The explanation that Dave and John gave on the missed field goal is that the college rule is that the ball has to be entirely inside the inside lining of the upright, where the NFL rule is that the ball has to be entirely within the outside lining of the upright, which means the ball can be over the upright and the kick can be good. I thought the kick was good. Hale thought the kick was good. I think most of West Virginia thought the kick was good. I thought their player shoved our player into Presley, which I thought was a violation of the fair catch rule, but then the exact same thing happened to them, so, college football karma. Nixon returned a kick out of the end zone and only got to the 17, what was he thinking? We let a short kickoff bounce instead of fair catching it. We roughed their place kicker. Like I said, very strange and uncharacteristic ST where our ST play has been excellent.
Coaches: A
Give the coaches their due. Look at that performance against South Alabama and then look at that performance yesterday. There has obviously been some coaching going on in between. There were rumors all over twitterX about players not wanting to play and wanting to leave and Gundy had lost the lockerroom. Does that look like a team that doesn't want to play for its coach? More than any other sport, football players have to believe in their coach in order to win. If they don't it won't look good. I'm telling you, this is a team that believes.
We are 5-2 and tied for second in the Big 12 with Iowa State, Texas, and Kansas State. A month ago this was unimaginable. Let's take care of business against 2-5, 0-4 Cincy and America's Biggest Homecoming. Ride with Pride! Go Pokes!
One last comment since I live in Michigan:
If Michigan was paying someone to watch Iowa's offense and steal signs, they should be fined by OSHA and not the NCAA. How many signals could there possibly be for "run it up the middle"? Why on earth would you need to steal the signs for "throw an incompletion"?
