First, Congratulations to the Men's Cross Country Team for winning Oklahoma State's 53rd NCAA National Championship!
It felt like the game started with the team still hung-over from last week... like we might let UCF beat us two weeks in a row. It felt like we desperately needed the defense to make a momentum changing play. And then it happened. After the interception it felt like a switch had been flipped. We scored the last 10 points before half-time and the game was never the same.
Grading the game really should be before and after the interception, but since it can't be graded that way, it's going to be graded on the whole.
Offense: B-
The offense gave them 9 points. If we don't spot them the 9 points then the game looks very, very different.
We moved the ball before the interception, we just didn't finish drives. On the other hand the offense put up 43 points, total offense 501 yards, 6 of 13 on third down which isn't bad, 4 for 4 in the red zone and if I recall correctly, 3 of those were TDs, the 4th a field goal only because we were out of time at the end of the 2nd quarter. That final touchdown drive, 10 plays and 5:04, that's some pretty dang good crunch time offense. Our offense after the interception: TD, FG, TD, TD, punt, FG, TD, victory formation. That's taking them to the woodshed.
Brennan Presley 15 catches for 189 yards, they couldn't cover him. Ollie effing Gordon 25 rushes for 164 yards and 3 TDs.
Alan Bowman 29/43 348 yards, 2 TDs, 1 int, 146.12 efficiency rating. He had a really good game.
Defense: A-
I know this grade is going to surprise some people, but look at the game as a whole. Yeah, we gave up some big plays and it was frustrating. However, if, before the game, you had told me that our defense was only going to give up 14 points in the first half and 7 points in the second half I would have taken it. After the interception, their offense: punt, punt, punt, punt, punt, TD, int. In the third quarter we gave up basically nothing to them - they only had 32 yards in the third quarter (or something like that). We held them to 2-11 on third down conversion and 0-2 on 4th down attempts and that's pretty salty. Now, they helped us with that some. They reverted to playing the kind of football that we're used to seeing Holgy-teams play, undisciplined and self-destructive (like Holgy). But, still, the defense gave them nothing except that one drive after halftime.
Oliver and Martin where their usual destructive selves. I swear they both deserve breakfast at Shortcakes, a full stack and orders of both bacon and sausage links.
Special teams: B-
We had an extra point blocked, we roughed the kicker. Will someone PLEASE tell Nixon NOT to run the ball out of the end zone. PLEASE! On the other hand, we were 2 for 2 on field goals and our kick coverage was excellent.
Coaching: B-
We obviously made excellent adjustments at halftime and certainly made better adjustments than they did. But, again, it looked like we came out flat, like we were still hung-over from last week, and last week we looked like we were hung-over from the post-Bedlam celebration. Maybe it's all out of our system now, because the second half looked like we were pretty much back to ourselves, the ourselves that won five games in a row against the best teams in the conference.
Oklahoma State fans: A+
Y'all showed up in Houston. I figured we would have a healthy contingent of fans in Houston and all the orange showed up on TV. Hearing the crowed roaring on the radio broadcast on Gordon's 62 yard run was freaking sweet! Well done Pokes fans, I'm proud of you! That's what we need going into the New Big 12, Pokes fans showing up everywhere and making their presence felt!
John and Dave mentioned on the radio broadcast that this was the 19th time in the Gundy era that we've come from 2 scores down to win and the 14th time since 2014. That's remarkable. On the TV broadcast they showed a graphic that Oklahoma State had been to 16 bowl games in its entire history before Gundy and now can expect its 18th in a row under Gundy.
I've posted a coaching pyramid before, with very few legendary coaches at the top, few truly great coaches, a few more good coaches, more mediocre coaches, and a lot of coaches that suck at the bottom. When hiring coaches it is difficult to move up the pyramid and easy to move down the pyramid - witness Texas A&M firing Jimbo Fisher after replacing Kevin Sumlin who replaced Mike Sherman who replaced Dennis Franchione who replaced R.C. Slocum. All good coaches, you might make the argument that R.C. Slocum with a career winning percentage of 0.731 was great. But Fisher, Sumlin, Sherman, Franchione... good coaches. Firing a good coach and hiring a great or legendary one is hard to do even if you have nearly unlimited resources which A&M has. My guess is their next coach won't produce any better results because there just aren't very many great or legendary coaches to go around. It is easier to go down the pyramid than up. Mike Gundy is a good coach.
We are tied for second in the conference with uO and Kansas State. The conference has clarified that we own the tie-breaker over them with one game to play. We have business left with BYU. Beat BYU and we're in the CCG for the second time in 3 years. I'm concerned about Gordon's ankle. Ride with Pride! Go Pokes!
It felt like the game started with the team still hung-over from last week... like we might let UCF beat us two weeks in a row. It felt like we desperately needed the defense to make a momentum changing play. And then it happened. After the interception it felt like a switch had been flipped. We scored the last 10 points before half-time and the game was never the same.
Grading the game really should be before and after the interception, but since it can't be graded that way, it's going to be graded on the whole.
Offense: B-
The offense gave them 9 points. If we don't spot them the 9 points then the game looks very, very different.
We moved the ball before the interception, we just didn't finish drives. On the other hand the offense put up 43 points, total offense 501 yards, 6 of 13 on third down which isn't bad, 4 for 4 in the red zone and if I recall correctly, 3 of those were TDs, the 4th a field goal only because we were out of time at the end of the 2nd quarter. That final touchdown drive, 10 plays and 5:04, that's some pretty dang good crunch time offense. Our offense after the interception: TD, FG, TD, TD, punt, FG, TD, victory formation. That's taking them to the woodshed.
Brennan Presley 15 catches for 189 yards, they couldn't cover him. Ollie effing Gordon 25 rushes for 164 yards and 3 TDs.
Alan Bowman 29/43 348 yards, 2 TDs, 1 int, 146.12 efficiency rating. He had a really good game.
Defense: A-
I know this grade is going to surprise some people, but look at the game as a whole. Yeah, we gave up some big plays and it was frustrating. However, if, before the game, you had told me that our defense was only going to give up 14 points in the first half and 7 points in the second half I would have taken it. After the interception, their offense: punt, punt, punt, punt, punt, TD, int. In the third quarter we gave up basically nothing to them - they only had 32 yards in the third quarter (or something like that). We held them to 2-11 on third down conversion and 0-2 on 4th down attempts and that's pretty salty. Now, they helped us with that some. They reverted to playing the kind of football that we're used to seeing Holgy-teams play, undisciplined and self-destructive (like Holgy). But, still, the defense gave them nothing except that one drive after halftime.
Oliver and Martin where their usual destructive selves. I swear they both deserve breakfast at Shortcakes, a full stack and orders of both bacon and sausage links.
Special teams: B-
We had an extra point blocked, we roughed the kicker. Will someone PLEASE tell Nixon NOT to run the ball out of the end zone. PLEASE! On the other hand, we were 2 for 2 on field goals and our kick coverage was excellent.
Coaching: B-
We obviously made excellent adjustments at halftime and certainly made better adjustments than they did. But, again, it looked like we came out flat, like we were still hung-over from last week, and last week we looked like we were hung-over from the post-Bedlam celebration. Maybe it's all out of our system now, because the second half looked like we were pretty much back to ourselves, the ourselves that won five games in a row against the best teams in the conference.
Oklahoma State fans: A+
Y'all showed up in Houston. I figured we would have a healthy contingent of fans in Houston and all the orange showed up on TV. Hearing the crowed roaring on the radio broadcast on Gordon's 62 yard run was freaking sweet! Well done Pokes fans, I'm proud of you! That's what we need going into the New Big 12, Pokes fans showing up everywhere and making their presence felt!
John and Dave mentioned on the radio broadcast that this was the 19th time in the Gundy era that we've come from 2 scores down to win and the 14th time since 2014. That's remarkable. On the TV broadcast they showed a graphic that Oklahoma State had been to 16 bowl games in its entire history before Gundy and now can expect its 18th in a row under Gundy.
I've posted a coaching pyramid before, with very few legendary coaches at the top, few truly great coaches, a few more good coaches, more mediocre coaches, and a lot of coaches that suck at the bottom. When hiring coaches it is difficult to move up the pyramid and easy to move down the pyramid - witness Texas A&M firing Jimbo Fisher after replacing Kevin Sumlin who replaced Mike Sherman who replaced Dennis Franchione who replaced R.C. Slocum. All good coaches, you might make the argument that R.C. Slocum with a career winning percentage of 0.731 was great. But Fisher, Sumlin, Sherman, Franchione... good coaches. Firing a good coach and hiring a great or legendary one is hard to do even if you have nearly unlimited resources which A&M has. My guess is their next coach won't produce any better results because there just aren't very many great or legendary coaches to go around. It is easier to go down the pyramid than up. Mike Gundy is a good coach.
We are tied for second in the conference with uO and Kansas State. The conference has clarified that we own the tie-breaker over them with one game to play. We have business left with BYU. Beat BYU and we're in the CCG for the second time in 3 years. I'm concerned about Gordon's ankle. Ride with Pride! Go Pokes!
