Cowboys’ secondary preps for tough test
STILLWATER — Oklahoma State safety Kolby Harvell-Peelwalked up to the podium to speak to the media wearing the No. 2 jersey of teammate Tanner McCalister.
But at least HarvellPeel had a good excuse for swiping his fellow safety’s jersey.
“A bunch of our emphasis in the offseason was on man coverage,” Harvell-Peel said. “Tanner McCalister is really good at man coverage. So I figured if I stole his jersey, maybe I could channel some of his energy moving forward.”
Harvell-Peel knows the Cowboy secondary has a tough matchup ahead with the Boise State receivers. OSU faces Boise State at 8 p.m. Saturday at Albertsons Stadium in Boise, Idaho.
The Boise State receiver group is led by Khalil Shakir, who has 257 yards and two touchdowns on 12 catches, averaging 21.4 yards per reception
through two games.
“They've got a lot of talent at their skill positions,” Harvell-Peel said. “Across the board and receiver, they're really skilled. Their offensive line does a great job of mixing run and pass looks.
“They're real disciplined, and they run a lot of things that are gonna force you to be disciplined — a lot of motions, a lot of bunches, a lot of things you don't typically see. So we're gonna have to be sound, we're gonna have to do our jobs well, and hopefully, if we do that, we play well.”
Boise State is averaging 301.0 passing yards and 42.5 points per game. The Cowboy defense is allowing 229 passing yards and 19.5 points per game.
“We've got a lot of confidence in what we can do as a defense,” HarvellPeel said. “(Defensive coordinator Jim) Knowles tells us every Saturday before the games, we can only control what we can control. It doesn't matter how many chances we got to go out there, how many times we gotta defend. If we gotta go out there, the goal is to get a stop.
“To be able to do that and help contribute to wins, it feels great.”
Malcolm’s rise up the charts
Linebacker Malcolm Rodriguez is on a torrid tackling pace to begin the season.
Through two games, he leads the FBS with 28 total tackles, 14 tackles per game and 17 solo tackles.
And he's quickly rising up the charts at OSU.
Rodriguez enters the weekend with 307 career total tackles, which puts him 12 away from reaching the top 10 in program history. He trails Paul Duren's 319 total tackles.
“He grabs everything,” said OSU safety Kolby Harvell-Peel, who is second on the team with 14 total tackles. “Selfishly, I want to make a couple more plays but he's just grabbing everybody — everybody that runs through gaps. He's hip-tossing linemen. “I don't know what makes Malcolm so great. It might just be his intangibles. He's smart. I know that's a big part of it. He's smart. He's a great tackler.”
The pace will be hard to keep up, but Rodriguez is on track to finish the year with 182 tackles, which would be second in program history behind Mike Green's 183 tackles in 1982.
That would also give Rodriguez 461 career total tackles, which would be third on OSU's all-time career list behind John Corker (496) and Mike Green (485).
Birmingham comfortable at left tackle
Until last week, Cole Birmingham estimated it had been “about two years” since he had played left tackle on any regular basis.
But early in the week prior to the Tulsa game, he got called into OSU offensive line coach Charlie Dickey's office, where he learned it was time to sharpen those left tackle skills once again.
Birmingham, a 6-foot-5, 308-pound redshirt sophomore from Katy, Texas, was a tackle in high school, but had settled in at guard in his time at OSU. He started the Missouri State game at right guard in place of injured Hunter Woodard.
But in an effort to fix some problem areas from the first game, Birmingham was moved to left tackle for Tulsa.
“There wasn't much practice before that,” Birmingham said of his history at left tackle.
But the move wasn't overly challenging for him.
“It's not too much different,” he said. “It's just going from right to left, so the leveraging is a little different. I just haven't played (tackle) in about two years, so it was a little bit of memory.”
Getting the offensive line up to par has been a challenge the first two weeks of the season, and getting players comfortable in new positions will be critical. Also, the Cowboys could get Woodard back this week, which should strengthen the line.