Rushing Defense Anchoring an Otherwise Below Average Oklahoma State Defense

Four games into the season, the narrative of this Oklahoma State football team on defense is that A.) The pass defense is suspect and B.) The rush defense is incredible because of the depth at defensive tackle.

And through those four games, that’s been proven to be true from a statistical standpoint.

The Pokes are allowing an impressive 143.3 yards per game on the ground, which currently ranks 54th nationally. That includes holding the high powered Baylor rushing game to just 136 last weekend. That number puts them third in the Big 12 conference behind Kansas State and TCU, who are allowing 72.3 and 130.5, respectively.

The strength of the Oklahoma State defense, without question, is the defensive tackle position lead by Vincent Taylor and Mote Maile, where OSU is also trotting out three deep with dudes like Darrion Daniels and DQ Osborne at backup. They have been consistent in stuffing the holes up front with the help of the group of linebackers like Jordan Burton, Chad Whitener and Devante Averette.

But Oklahoma State’s pass defense is bringing the total defensive measurements down to 87th nationally. They are allowing an awful 417.8 pass yards per game, which ranks 8th in the Big 12 just ahead of West Virginia and Texas Tech, who can barely field 11 players to throw out on defense. (For reference, the third best passing offense in the country is Wazzu, who averages 393 pass yards per game.)

“You can tell by looking at me,” Gundy said after the Baylor game. “And I told the team the same thing. You have to learn to take care of the ball and you have to learn to quit giving up so many big plays on defense.”

Oklahoma State will need to shore up their deficiencies in the secondary quick in order to compete in the pass happy Big 12. The schedule won’t be fair to OSU: They have the Texas Longhorns and No. 44 passing offense, lead by freshman gunslinger Shane Buechele, coming to town on Saturday. Something’s gotta give, and things will need to change in a hurry if they have any hopes of turning things around defensively.