Notebook: Oklahoma State Offense Sputtered When it Was Needed Most

Missed opportunities and costly mistakes will sully a game full of some big-time plays and record-setting performances. This one was tough swallow.

Let’s get into the notebook as I jotted down thoughts and observations throughout the game.

• It sure looked liked OSU should have started 14-0 after Baker Mayfield’s fourth interception on the year and a controversial fumbled scoop-and-score that was called back. What kind of difference would that have made?

• This will be one of those plays that gets talked about in a way the 2011 Quinn Sharp field goal in Ames gets talked about. Except this one has pretty solid video evidence.

HE LITERALLY TOOK NINE STEPS WITH THE BALL pic.twitter.com/EDGsgFNkp6

— Pistols Firing (@pistolsguys) November 4, 2017

• Calvin Bundage is a wild man. He almost had an all-time Bedlam play with that scoop-and-score that was called back. Then got dinged for neutral-zone infractions twice in the first quarter. After that he was pretty incredible. Bundage was active, played angry and got pressure on Mayfield all night, with two tackles for loss and two sacks. He’s going to be fun to watch the next couple of years.

• The Cowboys got started hot on defense with what looked to be back-to-back forced turnovers. OSU settled on for a field goal after A.J. Green caught his third interception in the past seven days, just the fourth one Baker Mayfield had thrown all season.

• And in true Bedlam fashion the fumble-scoop-and-score by Bundage was overturned. Both teams traded punts and it was on from there.

• After an uninspiring start by both offenses, someone opened the dam and the points flooded into BPS.

• The third quarter started off much like the first, with a punt from OSU. The offense got the ball back at its own 3-yard line and coughed it right back up to the Sooners at the 10-yard line.

• The Cowboy defense made some adjustments at halftime and sacked Baker Mayfield four times in two drives, even holding the Sooners to a field goal after the aforementioned fumble on the 10-yard line.

• OSU’s zero-point third quarter put it behind the eight ball. It also lost 2-0 in turnovers that period. OSU hasn’t won a third quarter against Oklahoma the last five years (it tied two).

• OSU’s defense obviously doesn’t get a pass here. It gave up the most yards in school history and 62 points. But Spencer’s crew did get some key stops and seemed to have made some halftime adjustments that stymied the Sooners and Mayfield to start the third quarter. But it didn’t take Baker long to find the open man and add some plays to his Heisman reel.

• On the other hand, holding OU to 3 points after that fumble at their own 10-yard line was a huge stop and the late Chad Whitener goal-line interception should have turned the tide. The defense got beat deep a lot but it gave OSU several chances late with the No. 1 offense in America, and Rudolph and the Cowboy offense came up short.

• It’s clear that Gundy did not want any part of a Matt Ammendola’s foot deciding this game. OSU faced a fourth an 12 on the OU 36-yard line, down 10 with 10 minutes remaining. If you give me that Bedlam scenario 10 times, I put my money down that Gundy does not go for it once. He did, and he maybe shouldn’t have.

• It would have been a 53-yard attempt which we know Ammendola has the range for and honestly no one would knock him for trotting “Philly” out there. Luckily, Marcell Ateman’s tip-toe catch that was called incomplete was overturned and the Cowboys scored a TD. If it hadn’t been, people would have torched Gundy. I get why he did it. I would get why he wouldn’t. That comes with the territory as a head coach and is something that’s easy to forget.

• OSU lost James Washington to an ankle injury and Oklahoma lost starting corner Jordan Thomas not long after. My thought at the time was that OSU could afford that loss more than OU could its loss. And I still think that was true.

• This play will haunt me. Mason Rudolph sailed one over a wide-open Tyron Johnson on what would have been the go-ahead score with a minute left.

• Oklahoma State won’t have long to lick its wounds because next up is a trip to Ames to face an Iowa State team that lost a close one in Morgantown. The loser of that game is effectively eliminated from the Big 12 title race.

• The Big 12 title race fell into place a little more on Saturday. TCU and Oklahoma are now tied for first which will change next week when the Horned Frogs head to Norman. In second place, it’s a three-way tie between OSU, Iowa State and West Virginia. OSU would need to win out and hope for two losses from either TCU or OU. The Cowboys have moved from the passenger seat back to the third row.