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Daily Bullets (Sept. 15): Defense Praised After Second-Half Shutout

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7 years ago

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The first part of this season has been fun, but I’m already fired up for next Saturday night.

Bullets Rundown

• OSU defense steps up
• Sanders needs to be better
• Chuba gallops

OSU Bullets

• This explanation of what OSU did differently in the third and fourth quarters was good. I get that it’s Tulsa (really, I do), but in-game moves that effect that much change are never insignificant.

“They got after us pretty good in the second quarter,” OSU head coach Mike Gundy said. “Got us tired and ran the ball down our throat.” So at halftime, Knowles made a fairly routine adjustment: he brought a secondary defender down into the box.

“The (OSU defensive coaches) changed our alignments,” Gundy said. “Got another guy up closer to the ball.

It was a basic change, but the encouraging part for a largely beleaguered OSU defense — with Big 12 Conference play looming next week in Austin, Texas — is that it was so effective. In the second half, the Golden Hurricane ran the football 21 times and gained only 30 yards. [Franchise]

Here’s what Bill Haisten added.

Gundy praised playmakers Chuba Hubbard, Tylan Wallace and Spencer Sanders after the game, but OSU’s coach seemed most pleased with his defensive coaches. [Tulsa World]

Now they just need to put the whole thing together for a week (aka: the story of every college football team). Also, Berry T. on the defense was also terrific.

• Spencer on Spencer.

“I don’t want to necessarily play the ‘young’ card,” Sanders said. “It’s not OK for me. We got the win, and I’m happy we got the win, but I’ve got to work on my part, and I’ve got to be better for this team.

“We can live it up tonight, but tomorrow, I’ve got to get better and I’ve got to do better.” [NewsOK]

He wasn’t lousy, but he also wasn’t great. And he’ll have to be great if OSU wants to beat Texas in Austin next weekend to get the Big 12 cranking.

• Chuba’s been galloping: I can’t get over the stat that there have only been nine 200-yard games in the Gundy era from running backs, and Chuba has two of them in the last 16 days. Kyle Cox on his outing was ?.

But OSU’s ground game, led by Chuba Hubbard, was the Cowboys offense. He kept them afloat early and pushed them to victory late.

Hubbard turned in a career-high of 256 yards on 32 carries (8 yards per), both of which topped a career mark set two weeks ago in Corvallis. His three rushing scores tied a career best for the second time. [PFB]

• Some good behind-the-curtain stuff from Robert Allen here.

However, inside the bunker that is the visiting locker room at Chapman Stadium, player leaders spoke to their teammates encouraging them to get ready for a second half and to take control back from Tulsa. It wasn’t always presented that nicely, but the message got across.

Meanwhile, in the coaches dressing room head coach Mike Gundy and offensive coordinator Sean Gleeson led the offensive staff in adjustments to get the Cowboys scoring “mojo” back against the ultra aggressive and risk taking Golden Hurricane defense.

Gundy left that room satisfied that the plans were taking proper shape and headed over to catch the defensive coaches doing the same thing. Then the plans and adjustments were presented. [Go Pokes]

• In case you missed it, Berry did the J.W. Walsh-Spencer Sanders comp and talked to Walsh about it. It’s good.

• Good stuff here from Frank Bonner II on Spencer’s Saturday struggles and why that could help him in the long run.

• Amazing story here by Jacob Unruh on Brock Martin and Malcolm Rodriguez.

• This is a good headline.

• Here are my 10 thoughts on the game and a notebook here.

• This from Gundy was really good.

• This was awesome.

• Not good!

Non-OSU Bullets

• The 49 greatest ESPN the Magazine stories.

• I’m not sleeping much these days so I’m blowing through Recursion by Blake Crouch. It’s excellent.

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