OSU Made History With Second-Biggest Comeback Ever in Victory Over WVU

The Cowboys have experienced one roller coaster of a season. Some of the mountains have been high (like wins against now three ranked opponents), but some of the valleys have taken the Pokes and their fans to depths they’ve not been accustomed to over Mike Gundy’s recent run of success.

Maybe OSU was due for a loss to Texas Tech based on the one-sided nature of that series of late (and the turnover at QB for both schools), but the losses in Manhattan and in Waco were inexcusable for different reasons.

The Kansas State loss stings because, in consecutive meetings, the better team did not come out on top. A win at Baylor was in Oklahoma State’s hands — even with an historically undisciplined performance — but the Cowboys watched that one slip away.

So why dwell on the past now that Oklahoma State has ensured an extra game in its future while closing down BPS on a good note? We’ll come back to that.

The Cowboys made quite a bit of history while doing this ? to the Big 12’s hopes of making the College Football Playoff. Tyron is the Big 12. Stoner is OSU.

Not only did this win punch OSU’s ticket to the postseason for a school record 13th consecutive year, it was the first time in program history that the Cowboys beat AP top 10 teams in back-to-back home games.

“We beat two top-10 teams,” Gundy said after the game. “And 3 yards away from beating three last week. So I’d say the guys are doing pretty good. They’re playing hard, I’m proud of them.

“We’re doing it with some new guys. We played a center that’s never played today. Didn’t have Justice (Hill), didn’t have (JD) King. So I’m proud of them for their effort and what they give to the program, and the character and culture to them means a lot.”

When the the clock ran out on the second quarter, the Cowboys faced a 17-point deficit after Taylor Cornelius’ second interception resulted in a West Virginia field goal. I thought the game was over. West Virginia probably thought the game was over. About half of the fans in the stands thought the game was over.

You don’t win those types of games against those types of offenses while committing those types of turnovers.

Oklahoma State has only come back from a bigger deficit once, back in 1979 when the Cowboys trailed Colorado 20-0 before scoring 21 unanswered point to pull off the 21-20 win.

But a 10-0 third quarter, in which Oklahoma State held the ball for 9:15 — thanks to its second-longest drive this season (6:40) — helped pull the Cowboys to within striking distance early in the final frame.

OSU’s offense was suddenly efficient (31 points on six drives) and, more importantly, its defense turned the screws on the No. 10 scoring offense in the nation and held the Mountaineers to their lowest red zone scoring percentage of the year.

At that point, it was all about making the plays needed to win the game. Something the Pokes had been consistently inconsistent at for much of the season. It led to not only the second biggest comeback in school history but also the fourth biggest fourth quarter comeback ever as the Pokes twice trailed by 10 in the fourth (including 41-31 with 7:37 left). Only three times have they recovered from a larger deficit than that (and one was in Bedlam 2014 ?).

“I think, to a certain extent, a team can get in the situation and think ‘Here we go again’, and not come through,” said Mike Yurcich after the game. “Our guys punched through. They broke through that glass. There have been those close calls. It can be a little bit like a disease and our guys just had a resilience about them and they deserve all the credit in the world.”

Mike Gundy-coached teams aren’t normally this erratic. I feel like we’ve been beating that drum hard and often enough this season to receive an eviction notice from our web space. Maybe it’s the youth. Maybe the margins for error that defined the “Cardiac Cowboys” captained by Mason Rudolph were even thinner than we thought.

Results like this baffle me and probably keep Mike Gundy up at night. Is OSU actually good? Sometimes they’ve looked downright bad. Where was this offense against Iowa State? But they’ve mostly worked their butt off to try to win and that’s something that I think most fans can get behind.

When it’s all said and done, I think we will look at this team as being exactly what it is. Probably a 7-, maybe 8- win group that was inconsistent, fun (at times) and fought its tail off. You’d hope that they can finish the year with some kind of momentum that can be carried into the next era of OSU football. That bowl ticket is a start.