Three Most Quotable Plays from OSU’s Win over Missouri State

Week 1 is in the books and Oklahoma State is 1-0 to show for it. While you won’t earn much street cred for blowing out Missouri State at home, there were some significant, quotable plays from Thursday night’s season opener.

Chuba’s Sprint and Score

Tales of Chuba Hubbard’s speed in practice were not exaggerated, as we all found out on Thursday. Mike Yurcich and Co. got the world-class runner the ball in space in several situations and it paid off for them. It also paid off for Hubbard who was named Big 12 Newcomer of the Week and earned top billing as OSU’s kick returner heading into Week 2.

On Monday, Mike Gundy talked about taking advantage of his playmakers like Hubbard.

“I think it’s easy,” Gundy said. “Fast guys in space is a really good thing for the offense and for the team. Mike (Yurcich) and (the other offensive coaches) understand the importance of getting the ball into the hands of the players that can make big plays.

“There are only so many plays that are executed the right way in an offensive game. If you have really skilled players and then you add the really fast ones, you can be really successful.”

Justice nearly goes post to post

Justice failing to reach pay dirt is not something we’re used to, but this run was significant for not only flipping the field and setting up a Sione Finefeuiaki TD, it was a statement by OSU’s best player.

After the Cowboys went to their best player four-straight times to start the game, he could probably see the writing (of his name) on the bench. Gundy threw out an arbitrary and low-shooting number of carries he wanted to limit Hill to, and he was well over halfway there with the Cowboys threatening to blow out the Bears in the first period.

At the end of the first quarter, with one last chance to put his imprint on the season opener, Justice sniffed a hole, side-stepped and headed down-Hill. If only he’d gotten one more step before running out of steam and tripping up at the 3-yard line.

“It would’ve been nicer if I had gotten into the end zone,” said Hill, “but I just wanted to go out there and make some plays and that’s what I did.”

Oklahoma State appears to be absolutely loaded at running back but make no mistake who the bread winner is in this offense, and the Cowboys will go as far as they can ride him.

Kenneth Edison-McGruder’s Fumble Recovery

Jim Knowles didn’t disappoint in his debut as OSU’s defensive coordinator. But let’s face it, anything less than a drumming of an FCS team would be cause for red flags.

But I did come up thinking “wow, OSU defenders seem to be everywhere”. They were running wild, back and forth and in the backfield. The Cowboys had four sacks and earned two turnovers including this strip and gather by Kenneth Edison-McGruder and friends.

Edison-McGruder relived the play on Thursday night.

“The quarterback ran a little option play, and one of my guys – if I’m not mistaken, I think it was Cole (Walterscheid) – had him up and we work everyday in that situation to come and strip the ball out,” Edison-McGruder said. “I saw that he was a bit lackadaisical with it and I just came and tried to strip it out and when I saw it pop out, I just fell on it as fast as I could.