Special teams mishaps nearly crippled Cowboys at West Virginia
MORGANTOWN, W.VA. — Mike Gundy’s Oklahoma State Cowboys spent their Saturday afternoon disproving one of their coach’s bedrock football theories.
Gundy regularly rattles off three key areas where a close game can swing in favor of one team: turnovers, major penalties and special teams play.
Considering that all three seemed to be wrapped up together in a big ball of disaster, it’s a bit of a shock that the Cowboys escaped with a 50-39 win at West Virginia on Saturday — much less a fairly comfortable one.
OSU’s special teams play was bleak at best, with multiple kicking mishaps and lackluster performance in the return game. Special teams accounted for two 15-yard penalties from lack
of discipline, with a personal foul on kickoff coverage and the rarely seen roughing the holder penalty on a West Virginia extra point try.
The first one moved West Virginia to midfield to start a possession. The second gave them a riskfree onside kick attempt.
“Blunders on special teams ... put us into a completely different game,” Gundy said.
Statistically, a blocked punt recovered for a touchdown doesn’t count as a turnover. But in the measure of impact, it’s worse.
“Poor protection and timing on the punt,” Gundy said. “The punter’s holding the ball too long and getting the punt blocked.”
That gave life to the Mountaineers, compounded less than a minute later when quarterback Mason Rudolph had an interception returned
for a touchdown to cut OSU’s lead to 30-24 in the third quarter.
Not that long ago, strong special teams play was a hallmark of OSU football. Not just the talented kickers and return men it produced, but the coverage units as well.
Gundy doesn’t have a special teams coordinator on his full-time staff, with graduate assistants handling much of the organizational work. And Gundy himself is significantly involved.
With the type of day the Cowboy specialists had on Saturday, it might prompt fans to ask how much the team is practicing special teams.
“It doesn’t look like any,” Gundy said, halfsarcastically. “I’m almost embarrassed to tell you that we probably spend more time on it now than we have in my career as a head coach.
“We work a lot on it. I know it looks like we don’t work on it, but we’re actually putting more time into it, when you talk about the combination of meetings and walk-throughs and actual reps in practice, than we ever have.”
Zach Sinor had an uncharacteristically bad day. Reliable all season, with the exception of a punt snap that went through his hands at Pittsburgh when the game was already well in hand, Sinor dropped the ball when holding for an extra point. Then he had the blocked punt.
Junior Matt Hockett stepped in for Sinor on the Cowboys’ final punt of the day. Hockett hit a 49-yard punt that was downed at the 3-yard line.
That was one of the few special teams bright spots, along with the
West Virginia punt that Sione Finefeuiake was able to get his hand on in the fourth quarter. That set up the Cowboys for a short touchdown drive that helped put the game away.
With the value he puts on special teams, Gundy will go back to work trying to figure out how to get the players ready for a pressure-packed Bedlam matchup this week.
“I’m very excited about the win, but I’ve never been fired up about teams that were undisciplined and had self-inflicted errors and mistakes,” Gundy said. “I’ve got to do a better job of minimizing what we do, to try to accomplish a little bit each week.
“We have to take care of the football, and we have to be sound in special teams in order to improve and give ourselves a chance to win.”