Why Did Oklahoma State Keep Switching Quarterbacks at Texas?

I have a lot of questions after OSU’s win over Texas on Saturday. Chief among them is why in the world OSU was switching out its QBs at the end of the game.

Mike Gundy didn’t give a great answer.

“(We were) trying to manage a little bit of the running game,” Gundy said. “Trying to mix up some of the looks. … We kind of had our hands tied a little bit there trying to find the best matchup. Those calls at that time were on me. That was just a choice, based on how our defense was playing.”

OK.

What about Mike Yurcich?

“The hope was to find ways to run the football. J’s an answer for us. Schematically, he does a great job for us. It’s a supplement. When you’re not moving the ball as you hoped to, changing gears is the way to go.”

Except that everybody knows Walsh is going to run it. That’s fine when you’re inside Texas’ 5-yard-line. It’s a bigger issue when you need to move the ball 30-40 yards to score in the fourth quarter on the road in a big game (OSU gained one non-penalized yard on the final two drives).

Still, there doesn’t seem to be a controversy. Rudolph is the guy.

“He knows he needs to play better,” Yurcich said. “He’s very capable of doing that. Really, it was just a few plays that seemed to us as coaches that are rare for him to make.”

“Today was his seventh game, so he’s running out of it being early in his career,” Mike Gundy added. “He needs to pick it up a little bit. But this is the best team he’s played this year. This team has speed. They’ve got size. They’ve got strength. I’m not trying to say that they’re something that maybe the public doesn’t think they are, but they’re still a talented team. It is early in his career, but he needs to play better. Period.”

J.W. Walsh and Mason Rudolph actually seemed pretty cool with everything.

“I think (Rudolph’s) demeanor was very good,” said Walsh. “He handled it awesome. He screwed up and he knows he did. I think for a minute he wanted to be down on himself, and the maturity took over. He told the defense, ‘My bad, help me out.’ He talked to the receivers and the rest of the offense and told them that we’ve got to keep going. Very proud of the way he handled it.”

Rudolph, knowing he was humbled in a monster moment, added what you want to see from QB1.

“We’ve done that a little bit up to this point and I’m trying to win and trying to be the best player I can be for Oklahoma State,” Rudolph said. “Whoever that’s going to be, if we’re going to switch out, we’re just happy to get the win.”

Let’s just not do it like that again.