For OSU, Texas Tech Provides Sobering Reality Check

STILLWATER — A typically jovial version of Mike Gundy was a shell of himself on Saturday night at his postgame press conference, stunned as any by the fact that Texas Tech beat — er, walloped — Oklahoma State 41-17 in Stillwater.

There was no vodka-spiked smoothie jokes, no Cornelius-related Denny’s ribbing. Only water and a sobering reality that OSU might not be the Big 12 title contender many believed it was when it rode the Broncos into the ground a week ago.

“No smoothie tonight,” said Gundy. “Just water when you get your ass kicked.”

And that’s exactly what it was. An ass-kicking. Oklahoma State didn’t score a single point over the final two quarters. They were outgunned by a freshman QB in Alan Bowman, outrushed by a trio of Tech backs, and out-game-planned by a Tech defense that OSU made look like Clemson-lite.

“It’s pretty simple,” said Gundy. “We got outcoached, outplayed, and they were a lot tougher than us. I don’t know really any other way to put it. They had really good plans, much better than ours.”

Taylor Cornelius threw for 258 yards, a touchdown and a pick on 18 -of-38 passing, averaging only 6.8 yards per completion. Meanwhile, though OSU couldn’t protect its QB consistently or carve out running lanes at a regular rate, Justice Hill posted an incredible 9.3 yards per rush.

He only touched the ball 12 times, though. An alternative way of saying that: Justice Hill averaged just shy of a first down every time he touched the ball, but as a team, OSU rushed it only 24 times. In large part, you can credit a struggling offensive line for getting away from the run game. But when you’ve got a dude in Hill who proved he can overcome that shortcoming, you ride said dude, no?

It’s a moot point, but nonetheless, fixing the running game — and whatever is happening up front — appears to be priority No. 1.

“We can’t rush the football when we want to rush the football,” Gundy said flatly. “And as I’ve said for six weeks, that’s a serious problem that we have to fix. We’re working hard, we’re getting as many reps as we can, we are just not making very good strides.”

OSU’s defense wasn’t much better on a night in which every facet of the team took a collective step back, but it’s hard to pin the blame there. The defense was on the field for 41 minutes and 17 seconds of the 60-minute contest. They were run into the ground by game’s end, and Tech bullied its way to an easy W.

There were few bright spots — though Tylan looked like the second coming of a mix of Justin Blackmon and James Washington — to suggest OSU can improve its deficiencies in a timely manner. For OSU, only a reality check. We know how it responded to adversity in Game 1 of league play, but can it get back up?

“I thought we had a good week, thought we had a good plan,” said Jim Knowles. “But everybody’s got a plan until you start to get punched.”