In a Year of Transition, Oklahoma State’s Defense has Been Worse Than Normal

#RealTalk time. We’ve discussed the Spencer Sanders (non) situation ad nauseam over the last week or so. QB is one big issue for the Pokes, but this is also the lowest hanging fruit for us. It’s fun to think about a QB of the future rescuing the present, even if it becomes less and less likely to happen with each Mike Gundy podcast appearance. It’s not as fun to think about an offensive line with fewer potential answers or a defense that’s trending in the wrong direction.

It’s the latter I want to touch on today as OSU enters … gulp … the true meat of its schedule as it relates to offensive opponents. OSU — ranked No. 17 in the country in points per drive — is No. 2 in the Big 12. Here’s how the teams currently stack up offensively (I’ve crossed out which teams OSU has already faced).

1. Oklahoma: 4.1 PPD
2. Oklahoma State: 2.8
3. Texas Tech: 2.7
4. West Virginia: 2.7
5. Texas: 2.4
6. Baylor: 2.4
7. Kansas State: 2.3
8. Iowa State: 2.1
9. TCU: 1.6
10. Kansas: 1.6

First, what are you doing TCU?! Second, OSU’s defense faces four of the five best offenses in the Big 12 in its next four games (not including itself).

It’s easy to watch games — especially that Kansas State game — and note that stats don’t tell the entire story. OSU is trending in the wrong direction offensively, even though the numbers say they haven’t been that bad. On the flip side, the numbers say they’ve been absolutely atrocious on defense (which they have been!), and the last two games don’t offer much hope there.

Jim Knowles’ more aggressive schemes — which Mike Gundy has wondered aloud have maybe been too “multiple” — have helped the Pokes to a No. 1 ranking in the nation in sacks per game (4.3, nobody else is above 4.0), but the fallout is a defense that is allowing nearly 2.5 points per drive, not even in the top 90 nationally.

This is not good (obviously), and it’s probably due to a combination of Knowles adjusting to a new conference, OSU playing loads of young, inexperienced players (they’re starting true freshmen at both safety positions) and a sudden lack of fire on that side of the ball. Add it all up, and the entire thing is … disconcerting to say the least. OSU fired a defensive coordinator who was consistently producing top-50 or top-60 defenses (not that this is good by any means) for one who can’t crack the top 90 with the more raucous part of the slate upcoming?

“Defensively, we go through phases where we don’t defend the deep ball really well, then we haven’t defended the run very well,” said Mike Gundy this week. “We really haven’t put that together, so I would like to see us do that. That would be a good start.”

To highlight how bad it’s been, I went back and looked at all the drives for OSU’s common opponents in 2017 and 2018. Kansas, Kansas State, Iowa State and Texas Tech. Not exactly a murderer’s row of offensive firepower (outside of Kliff)!

I’ve highlighted every game where they’ve been worse defensively (also I took out things like pick-sixes and kick returns — those are on Yurcich’s offense and Gundy’s (?) special teams).

2017 Texas Tech: 12 drives | 27 points | 2.3 PPD
2018 Texas Tech: 13 drives | 41 points | 3.2 PPD

2017 Iowa State: 14 drives | 42 points | 3 PPD
2018 Iowa State: 15 drives | 48 points | 3.2 PPD

2017 Kansas State: 15 drives | 38 points | 2.5 PPD
2018 Kansas State: 11 drives | 31 points | 2.8 PPD

2017 Kansas: 14 drives | 17 points | 1.2 PPD
2018 Kansas: 14 drives | 28 points | 2 PPD

2017 total: 55 drives | 124 points | 2.3 PPD
2018 total: 53 drives | 148 points | 2.8 PPD

In every single Big 12 game this year OSU has been worse defensively than they were in the same game in 2017. They lost a lot on that side of the ball — Tre Flowers, Ramon Richards, Darrion Daniels and some LB depth — but you’d think they would be able to make up for it with experience a corner and an all-time Jordan Brailford season. So far they haven’t.

One thing to note here is that Oklahoma State usually fades as the year goes on. This happens because they don’t have the talent depth to roll into late November with the heaviest hitters in the league. Three of these 2017 games — Kansas, KSU and Iowa State — all happened late in the year when OSU was already worn down. And they’re still outperforming this year’s team early in the conference.

All of this is (obviously) really, really bad.

And there are no easy answers. I thought Oklahoma State had a real chance to have an elite defense in the Big 12 this year. Not only have they not shown that thus far, they haven’t even really been anywhere close to average (only Baylor ranks below them so far in the Big 12). Remember the angst and outrage at the end of last year over giving up almost 100 combined to Iowa State and Kansas State in consecutive weeks? They’ve been … worse (!) this go around.

A source I’ve talked to in Stillwater noted that Knowles and his players aren’t meshing as well as you would like at this point in his tenure, and I think the second half of the Kansas State game was evidence of that. There wasn’t much fight on that side of the ball. There wasn’t much of anything other than plodding Kansas State touchdown after plodding Kansas State touchdown.

Hopefully they found something (someone?) during the bye week, though, because with the unique challenges OU, Texas and West Virginia pose offensively, it would appear that things will get worse (maybe much worse!) before they get anywhere close to better.