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Bedlam 2007-2008

Football:

Oklahoma State's regular season ended much like it began. The Cowboys got mashed up front by a far more physical opponent. The 2007 campaign began with a 35-14 loss at No. 13 Georgia, and continued Saturday afternoon with a 49-17 loss at No. 10 Oklahoma.

Things seemed fine in the beginning of both games for OSU, but quickly unraveled after some old-fashioned, smash-mouth football by the other guys. Cowboys coach Mike Gundy feared the worst up front going against OU, and his fears soon became a nightmare. "This one's pretty easy to explain,” Gundy said after being disposed of by the Sooners. "We're not physical enough up front ... They lined up and ran the ball right down our throat. We weren't physical enough, or tough enough up front to slow them down.”

Never was this more evident than on OSU's third possession. Trailing 21-7, the Cowboys had a first-and-goal at the OU 1-yard line. Two straight handoffs to 230-pound fullback Julius Crosslin in the "Jumbo” package resulted in no yardage. A third-down keeper by quarterback Zac Robinson did the same. On fourth-and-1, Robinson faked an inside handoff and was all by his lonesome as he rolled to his right. Robinson fought for yardage and held the ball out front of him as if he were trying finger roll playing basketball.

He lost control of the ball just as it was about to cross the goal line. The ball was knocked back to the 13-yard line, where it was recovered by OU strong safety D.J. Wolfe. Had Robinson scored, OSU would have pulled to within 21-14 with 6:25 left in the second quarter. Instead, there was a 14-point swing as the Sooners methodically marched 87 yards in 11 plays to make the score 28-7.

Failing to score in the middle of the second quarter didn't cost the Cowboys the game, but it could have made things a whole lot more interesting for a while longer. The next time the Cowboys' offense was in a goal-line situation, they were in a spread formation and scored in one play when tailback Dantrell Savage scored standing up from 6 yards out. "You only had to slap me upside the head once,” Gundy said of not going Jumbo again. "I'm not going to go in there and do it again, that's why I spread them out.”

OSU's lack of size has been a problem all season, not just on Saturday. Gundy repeatedly has preached about it. Half the time, the Cowboys were able to overcome their shortcomings. Half the time, they weren't. This explains their 6-6 record heading into their bowl game.

When a team is physically outmatched up front like OSU, what needs to click for that team to be successful? "You always have to have a very good plan, and then you have to use a lot of movement,” Gundy explained. "What happens is when you use movement and try to stunt and hit gaps, if you guess the wrong way, you fail to get a good push. You have to guess right, and it makes it more difficult for us to play them straight ahead.”

In other words, the bully on the beach kicks sand in your face. To correct this, you work hard to get bigger and stronger, and then return to settle the score. That's what the Cowboys face right now. They need to come back bigger, stronger and better next season. Or they'll continue to get mashed by the big, bad bullies on the block.

John Rohde. Rohde: Smaller Pokes are smacked around by big ol' Sooners. The Oklahoman. Sunday, November 25, 2007.

Basketball:

How Did OSU Almost Win

The Cowboy question after another wild night of Bedlam, the kind we've come to expect no matter the state of these two basketball rivals, is not how did Oklahoma State manage to lose another tight game. Instead, it's how did OSU almost win? How did a game that seemed so one-sided go down to the chewed-fingernail wire? How did State stay close when it struggled so much to merely hit the rim, much less send the ball through the hoop? How did Oklahoma win only 64-61, when it shot 50 percent from the field, attempted 19 more foul shots than did the Cowboys and made OSU huff and puff just to get the ball launched toward the basket?

Obi Muonelo is the easy answer. Obi and grit. Muonelo scored a career-high 25 points, throwing in almost half (eight) of OSU's 18 baskets. Nothing came easy for Muonelo; he sank hurried 3-pointers and acrobatic drives to the basket. If Muonelo had missed the bus, OSU would have been blown out early.

But the Cowboys persevered, which is more than you can say for their recent downfalls. This is OSU's fifth straight loss — and 17th straight road defeat, dating back 23 months — and none of the five have been by more than eight points. The last three were margins of two, three and three.

But OSU didn't wilt in this one. The Cowboys played hard and smart and tough; they didn't die until Byron Eaton's running 3-pointer at the buzzer bounced off the backboard. "It's tearing us up inside,” Eaton said. "We're right there on track to get a win. We just gotta close it out.”

This game in style was a far cry from the Bedlam classics of earlier this decade. One team going nowhere and another fighting to avoid the same fate. The fans knew it, too. On the same day that OU announced the Feb. 23 Bedlam women's game is a sellout, Lloyd Noble Center wasn't even full for the men's game: the crowd count was 11,141, a few hundred short of capacity. When's the last time you saw empty seats at Bedlam?

The slugfest didn't lack for spirit, though. It was a game of hard knocks and bad blood, with OSU's Martavius Adams taking down OU's Taylor Griffin on a rebound, and Eaton flying over tables and crashing to the court, and Blake Griffin, in an encore from his Willis Reed impersonation at Baylor, fighting for every inch of position in the paint, and OSU's Marcus Dove making like an octopus, with harassing tentacles reaching to all corners of the court.

But OSU failed to overcome its offensive ineptness. When Muonelo wasn't on fire, the Cowboys were hard-pressed to score. OSU turned cold in the first half with a stretch that makes fans wonder about Sean Sutton's reputation as an offensive whiz: nine straight possessions without scoring, including five turnovers in a row and seven in eight possessions; the only shot in that span came on James Anderson's forced jumper. OU's David Godbold blocked that right back into Anderson.

In the second half, OSU went 4 1/2 minutes without scoring, five straight empty possessions, and went more than nine minutes without a field goal. "We don't get easy baskets,” Sutton said. "We don't have a guy that can score inside. That's one reason we go through scoring droughts. We don't have anybody we can throw the ball to inside.” Or outside at times. Terrel Harris was a no-show again; zero points, one shot and virtually no aggression in 27 minutes. Freshman Anderson continues to regress; 2-of-8 shooting, with no open looks, in 29 minutes.

At least the Cowboys played tough defensively. The Sooners shot 50 percent from the field primarily because OSU refused to let Blake Griffin get off shots (four). The Cowboys double-teamed Griffin, letting him fire passes to Taylor Griffin for easy buckets, but they made Blake earn his keep.

And OSU had a chance to win. Even in the final 10 seconds, when the Cowboys were caught without a timeout — inexcusable — and failed to foul backup OU point guard Omar Leary, who had the ball with eight seconds left on an inbounds. Instead, the Sooners ran the clock down to 2.9 seconds before fouling Tony Crocker. That gave Eaton scant time to fire off a game-tying shot. "I wish it had went down,” Eaton said. "We'd still be out there playing right now.”

Berry Tramel. Muonelo reason it was close. The Oklahoman. Tuesday, January 29, 2008.

The Cowboys Had A Slim Chance At NCAA Tournament

Three weeks ago, Oklahoma State University men's basketball coach Sean Sutton told his team all was not lost, even though his Cowboys had an 11-12 record and had lost seven of its last eight games. "We've got seven games left, and we've got a chance to win all of them,” Sutton told his team at the time. "We want to get to the Big 12 Tournament playing our best basketball of the year and we'll see what happens.”

Finishing the regular season without another loss seemed farfetched, but OSU indeed hadn't lost since — until Bedlam arrived Wednesday night. The University of Oklahoma snapped the Cowboys' rather miraculous five-game winning streak with a 68-56 upset before a crowd of 13,459 inside Gallagher-Iba Arena.

Even more upsetting for OSU, the Sooners were able to pull it off with their best player not even in the building. OU freshman forward Blake Griffin was back in Norman nursing an injured knee. Sophomore guard Tony Crocker picked up the slack by scoring a career-high 25 points.

OSU's streak had included upset victories at No. 16-ranked Texas A&M and Missouri and at home against Baylor and No. 4 Kansas. What slim chance the Cowboys had at an NCAA Tournament bid likely was dashed Wednesday night. Their only hope is to win next week's Big 12 Tournament in Kansas City, Mo., which would gain them an automatic berth.

John Rohde. Cowboys' NCAA hopes dim. The Oklahoman. Tuesday, March 6, 2008.

Wrestling:

Sunday, December 02, 2007

Third-ranked Oklahoma State continued its dominance in the Bedlam wrestling series with a 21-9 victory over No. 21 Oklahoma Sunday. A crowd of 4,144 watched the Cowboys jump out to a 9-0 lead and never look back en route to their 19th consecutive win over Oklahoma. The Cowboys are now 26-0-1 in the last 27 Bedlam duals and gained a 100-win edge in the all-time series with Oklahoma by upping their advantage in the all-time series to 124-24-9.

Freshman Ben Ashmore opened his Bedlam career with an impressive 6-0 win over Joey Fio. Ashmore picked up takedowns in the first and third periods and tacked on 2:47 riding time to give the Cowboys a quick 3-0 lead. The Cowboys picked up decisions from seniors Coleman Scott and Nathan Morgan, who were wrestling in their final home Bedlam dual. Scott scored a narrow 1-0 victory over OU 133-pounder Brian Shelton, while Morgan cruised to a 9-4 decision over 15th-ranked Sooner 141-pounder Zack Bailey. “I want more. I understand what this team needs to do to be successful and we didn’t do enough today,” Oklahoma State coach John Smith said. “The positive we can take from this, other than winning, is that we got some takedowns when we needed to get them.”

OU jumped on the board at 149 pounds with Will Rowe’s 10-4 decision over Quinten Fuentes. Late in the third period Rowe looked to be headed towards a major decision, but Fuentes scored a late escape and takedown to hold the Sooners to three team points. The next three matches essentially put the dual away as the Cowboys picked up three straight wins to stretch the lead to 18-3.

Newly McSpadden started the run with a solid performance in a 6-1 decision over Chad Terry. Following a scoreless first period, McSpadden exploded with takedowns in each of the last two periods and picked up 1:39 riding time. Senior transfer and 165-pounder Jake Dieffenbach was another Cowboy to earn a victory in his first Bedlam match, claiming a hard-fought 3-2 victory over No. 16 Max Dean with a second period takedown being the difference in the match. “I haven’t wrestled in front of that many people, so that got the nerves out of me real quickly,” Dieffenbach said. “(Dean) is a guy who likes to slow down the match and work on your head and I feel like I wrestled at his pace. I didn’t do what I wanted, but it’s still good to get a win.” “This was a good win for Jake Dieffenbach,” Smith said. “He got more aggressive in the second period. Make no mistake, his opponent was a top-10 guy who is a quality opponent.”

Fifth-ranked Brandon Mason pushed the Cowboy lead to 15 with a 5-0 decision over Jeff James at 174 pounds. Mason picked up two takedowns and an escape in the victory. The Sooners finally jumped back on the board when 11th-ranked 184-pounder Josh Weitzel outlasted Cowboy freshman Cody Hill, 3-2. Hill was the aggressor all match, but Weitzel rode him out the entire third period and his 1:17 riding time proved to be the difference.

At 197, true OSU freshman Clayton Foster had a third period rally fall just short against ninth-ranked Joel Flaggert, ultimately falling, 12-10. Foster trailed, 8-4 after two periods and after a wild third period, nearly took Flaggert down in the final seconds to send the match into overtime.

The Cowboys closed out the dual with a 6-3 decision by 10th-ranked Jared Rosholt at heavyweight over No. 20 Nathan Fernandez. Rosholt picked up two takedowns in the third period to secure the win and tacked on 1:11 riding time to give the Cowboys a 21-9 final score. “We want to outscore our opponents late,” Smith said. “If you outscore your opponent in the third period, you’ll come out on the winning end a lot of the time.”

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Third-ranked Oklahoma State saw its 19-match winning streak over Oklahoma come to an end Thursday in McCasland Fieldhouse, as the 17th-ranked Sooners picked up an 18-15 upset win over the Cowboys. OU got off to a good start when sixth-ranked 184-pounder Joshua Weitzel pinned OSU’s Jack Jensen in 2:18 in the first match of the evening. No. 9 Joel Flaggert followed with a 9-6 win over Clayton Foster at 197 pounds to give the Sooners a 9-0 lead in the dual that they never surrendered. Jared Rosholt, Coleman Scott, Nathan Morgan, Jake Dieffenbach and Brandon Mason were all winners for the Cowboys by decision, but the pin combined with Joey Fio’s upset win over Tyler Shinn at 125 pounds were too much for OSU to overcome.

Baseball:

In the first two Bedlam games, OU managed just two runs thanks to poor clutch hitting. In those games, the Sooners were 1-of-11 with runners in scoring position and 3-of-21 with two outs. In the three Bedlam games, the Pokes scored a combined seven runs in the first inning. The three-game Bedlam attendance total reached 33,487, that was up from the 32,697 who showed up last year, but not as many as the 35,177 who attended the 2006 series.

Cowboys coach Frank Anderson spewed more than a few choice words at home-plate umpire Bob Homolka during Sunday's game, but he was well-composed after the loss — as he should be, seeing how his team closed the regular season by winning its final six conference series. Anderson had to strain his brain to recall the last time his team didn't take at least two out of three from a league opponent (it was at Kansas State in late March).

OSU is hotter than any of the league's high-seeds. Top-seeded Texas A&M was swept by No. 5-seeded Texas and the Aggies ride a five-game losing streak into the league tournament, which will be held Wednesday through Sunday. "That just shows you that for them to win 15 straight games in the conference was a pretty amazing feat," Anderson said.

Third-seed Nebraska was swept by Missouri in the final weekend. Their side of the Big 12 pool seems to set up nicely for the second-seeded Cowboys, who have plenty at stake this week. Anderson has some serious bait to dangle in front of his players. OSU figures to host its first NCAA regional at Allie P. Reynolds Stadium since 1997. And if the Cowboys can capture the Big 12 Tournament crown, they should be tabbed as one of eight sites to host a best two-out-of-three Super Regional.

Anderson is the type guy who clams up when discussing hypothetical scenarios. He's so cautious he publicly has yet to acknowledge his 40-15 team has even clinched a bid to the 64-team NCAA Tournament, which it certainly has. Anderson nearly conceded an NCAA bid during his post-game interview session when he said "knock on wood" while tapping the side of his head.

A few seconds later, with no one within earshot, Anderson conceded, "You know what, I think they have to look at us (as a regional site). "I don't know exactly how they figure these things. There are a lot of RPIs and a lot of people on those committees who make those decisions. I would think we would have to at least make a good showing in the Big 12 Tournament (to secure a Super Regional bid). But when you look at our body of work, it's not too bad."

John Rohde. Oklahoma State streaking into the Big 12 tournament. The Oklahoman. Monday, May 19, 2008.

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