Eric Morris, Cowboys Searching for Answers in the Red Zone After Offense Struggles Again at Houston

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HOUSTON — When the team was winning, it almost felt like a sick, but frustrating, joke that one of the best offenses in the country struggled in the red zone.

On Saturday night, when the Cowboys had a chance to put themselves on the shortlist for a Big 12 Championship spot, that inability to capitalize came back to haunt No. 18 Oklahoma State for the second time this season as the team fell 35-32 to No. 20 Houston.

“Huge problem,” Eric Morris said. “That’s why I opened with it to start my statement tonight. That’s been a problem for the last couple weeks — actually the whole entire year. Go back to the first drive of our season offensively. We drive down and don’t get it on fourth down against Tulsa.”

In many ways, Oklahoma State couldn’t have gotten off to a better start. Cornerback LaDainian Fields took an interception 20 yards the other way, setting the offense up past midfield. Two completions later, OSU stood at Houston’s 10-yard line.

As it turned out, that’s right where the Cougars, and seemingly every other defense, want the Cowboys.

Oklahoma State settled for a field goal from the 5-yard line. So much for the jugular.

On the very next drive, Oklahoma State went right back down the field. This time, the Cowboys ran four plays from within Houston’s 8-yard line, but Morris couldn’t bring himself to pull the offense off the field on 4th-and-2, resulting in a turnover on downs.

“Hindsight is 20/20,” Morris said. “Going back, I chased some points again. Look back, maybe if I had kicked that field goal early, here we are. Tie ballgame, and maybe we find a way to get it into overtime. So it is something that I got to soul-search on, and we had so much momentum. I felt like both of those two drives to start the game, and we’re marching it down and hit some big plays. To come away with just three at halftime is bad for them.”

It was a huge deviation for Morris, who has largely chucked the analytics book in the trash when it comes to field goals in the red zone. In wins over UCF, West Virginia and Oregon, Morris always chose to kick when faced with fourth-and-anything inside the red zone.

The Cowboys have pulled the offense for kicker Sam Keltner at the opposing 1-, 2-, 6-, 11-(twice), 12- and 13-yard lines.

“We can’t be a team that can’t score in the red zone,” OSU quarterback Drew Mestemaker said. “(Can’t be) an offense that is a one-half, two-half team. We have to play a full game on offense, and it starts with me. I have to play better at the end of the day.”

Oklahoma State finished the game with three touchdowns and one field goal on five total red zone opportunities, but even some of the successes were suspect. Running back Ayo Adeyi looked lucky if he got back to the line of scrimmage on his 13-yard touchdown, but then he managed to bounce away from what looked to be OSU’s worst run of the night and sprinted into the end zone thanks to a nearly empty perimeter.

Receiver Wyatt Young’s 2-yard touchdown pass on OSU’s next drive came after the Cowboys moved the chains on 3rd-and-3 thanks to a pass interference call drawn by Young. That play was only possible after OSU overcame 2nd-and-12.

Morris was asked about the issue for what feels like at least the 10th time this season. This time he was asked if it was an offensive line issue.

“Yeah, I think probably,” Morris said. “I mean, we’re not just huge interiorly right now. But that’s my job as a coach, is I gotta put them in better positions and figure out what we can execute. I thought there later, we went to being able to put the ball in the air a little bit more and utilize that when we got a little bit closer down there and were able to punch a couple in.”

Last week, the Cowboys brought 284-pound defensive end Malik Charles out at tight end to bolster the offensive line near the goal line. The Cowboys showed that look again tonight and sent offensive tackle Braydon Nelson out at tight end as well before a timeout led to them changing the look.

Both running back Caleb Hawkins and Drew Mestemaker expressed frustration over the inability to score consistently in the red zone.

“Maybe a repetitive thing,” Hawkins said when asked if the issues scoring changed game-to-game. “I was saying earlier that it is a mental block that I feel like we have, and once we get out of that and get out of our heads, we’re going to be fine.”

Mestemaker said opponents are selling out to keep Hawkins out of the end zone down there, so the offense has to find another way to score.

He, too, felt the offense was plagued by a repeated issue when it came to the team’s mindset.

“I guess you can put it all into the same category of not executing,” Mestemaker said. “It’s not like we’re not strong enough to be down there. It’s not like the other team (is) pulling out these magical plays. We’ve just got to execute the play call at the end of the day.”