Nice kicks
It’s a Coaches vs. Cancer game here in College Station, and the Oklahoma State coaching staff is sporting some pretty loud orange shoes. The Cowboys are sporting their equally loud orange unis. Interesting how they’ve become the default uniform this year, isn’t it? Used to be that orange was reserved for big games and, most recently, slump-busting efforts on the road.
by andrea cohen
Marshall Moses is starting …
in place of Malcoln Kirkland. Assistant coaches tell me it’s more to do with overall performance in games and practices rather than punishing Kirkland for a dirty foul during Bedlam on Monday.
Moses hasn’t been starting, but his minutes (and numbers) have been eclipsing Kirkland’s for weeks.
-by andrea cohen
Which Voice of the Cowboys?
I’m sitting around at Reed Arena waiting for tip and had a quick chat with John Holcomb, OSU’s radio color guy, who told me something kind of amusing.
The headline on Scott Wright’s article about offensive play calling had a headline that referred to a “new voice” calling plays. Holcomb tells me that a bunch of people, after just reading the headline, called with concern about “Voice of the Cowboys” Dave Hunziker, thinking he was the one being replaced. Fret not, OSU fans, Hunziker isn’t going anywhere.
by andrea cohen
Brad Garrett says he’s done
I ran into Brad Garrett a minute ago and asked him a question I’ve been wondering for a while now: Are you coming back?
No, he said. The injury-plagued redshirt sophomore/junior said he plans to finish school and “Get on with my life.”
Garrett, a transfer from the College of Southern Idaho, injured his shoulder two Novembers ago when OSU was playing in the Maui Invitational. He had surgery and was out all of last season. This fall he was having problems with his leg — trainers thought it was a stress fracture for a while, and he was in and out of a protective walking boot. He participated in some practices early in the year, but hasn’t been suited up for a couple of months now.
OSU coaches said last week that his status was still rather uncertain, but Garrett seemed pretty sure this afternoon that he won’t be playing basketball again.
by andrea cohen
Mike Gundy and the defense
By Scott Wright
It’s becoming less and less clear how Mike Gundy will manage his team in 2009.
A couple weeks ago, I asked Gundy if he thought he’d be calling plays again next year, and he said he wasn’t sure.
A few days later, offensive coordinator Gunter Brewer pulled his name out of contention for a job at Minnesota where he would have been the play-caller to stay at a place where he didn’t call plays.
And a few days after that came this quote from new defensive coodinator Bill Young when asked what he thought Gundy’s involvement with the defense would be: “He will be involved with the defense all week long. During games, he’ll be focused in on calling the offensive plays, but from Sunday until Saturday morning he’ll be involved defensively, too.”
Granted, Young clearly says Gundy will be calling plays during the game. But the rest of the quote doesn’t mesh with Gundy’s philosophy from the 2008 season.
To be a play-calling head coach, Gundy said he had to cut back his involvement in other areas, primarily the defense. He regularly pointed out that he didn’t watch the defense during games when he was sitting on a box away from the field planning the next offensive series. And he regularly told the media that he was not in tune with the defensive game plan, or the construction thereof, throughout the week or on game day.
So if Gundy is planning to be involved with the defense all week, he’ll have to be leaving offensive game planning in the hands of someone else, at least occasionally. And it doesn’t seem like a good idea for the play-caller to be stepping out of the meeting room on a regular basis. But when he said last year that he’d be calling plays, Gundy seemed very certain that he couldn’t do both: prepare the offense as the play-caller and maintain a working knowledge of the defensive plan throughout the week.
Maybe all of this is empty talk and a series of coincidences. Or maybe Gundy is reworking his staff management, and in doing so, preparing to hand off the play calling.
It’s hard to argue with OSU’s offensive success when Gundy was calling the shots. But Gundy’s amount of control, especially on game day, could have had an impact on the Cowboys’ ability to keep assistant coaches around.
So yeah, weird day in Lincoln
Welcome to Bizarro World, where OSU is winning 29-27 at the half with zero points from conference-game leading scorer Obi Muonelo and five combined points from James Anderson (avg. 17.9) and Byron Eaton (13.7).
Freshman Keiton Page, who came off the bench, was the only Cowboy to score a field goal in the first eight minutes of the game and between Page and Marshall Moses OSU’s bench is outscoring its starters 17-12.
Very, very odd.
by andrea cohen
Thoughts on the first 8 minutes in Lincoln
Ooof.
For starters, I was wrong about starters — Byron Eaton got the start at the point. However, Keiton Page made a VERY quick entrance and has scored the Cowboys’ only field goals of the game thus far.
Nebraska is definitely succeeding in setting the tempo here (the score is 9-6 with 11:42 to go) and OSU is shooting the ball terribly to help them out.
Also of note: Travis Ford has just gone to the all-guard lineup of Page, Eaton, James Anderson, Terrel Harris and Obi Muonelo.
by andrea cohen
Don’t be stunned if there’s a change to the starting lineup
Travis Ford said he’s torn.
“I don’t know,” Ford said. “It’s definitely in my mind but I kinda like having that option. Malcoln hasn’t hurt us in the first two or three minutes of a game. He gets you going and you always have
It seems Ford likes to have two guys to give him energy off the bench.
“(Moses) is going to play 25 minutes,” Ford said. “Whether I start him or not, I just kinda like having that guy over there, two guys that are really coming off the bench now. He’s gonna play 22, 25 minutes. At least he should if he’s playing as well and as hard as he is. He’s doing a pretty good job, he’s working hard.”
No guarantees, but it also wouldn’t be completely stunning to see Keiton Page get the start over Byron Eaton at
By Andrea Cohen
Pettigrew’s NFL stock still rising
By Scott Wright
If you’ve been following any of the workout news from this week’s Senior Bowl, you’ve been hearing the name of Oklahoma State tight end Brandon Pettigrew quite often. His dual-talent skill set continues to impress scouts and coaches as they begin to narrow down their draft possibilities.
NFL.com writer Steve Wyche tossed out this analysis of Pettigrew’s performance in practices for the college all-star game, and here’s another one from draftboardinsider.com.
This analysis piece from the National Football Post calls him “possibly the best blocking/receiving tight end to come along in years.”
The Atlanta Falcons don’t pick until No. 24, but they seem to be interested in Pettigrew as well, says the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
ESPN’s Todd McShay has bumped him up to No. 13 on his overall board and Mel Kiper has suggested Pettigrew could go as high as No. 9 in the Draft on April 25-26.
The scouting combine is in mid-February and will be another important piece of the puzzle for the Cowboy standout. But for now, he has himself in position to be rated high by most teams.
Reggie Herring or a red herring?
By Scott Wright
The Reggie Herring saga continues today, with multiple reports out of Dallas in which Herring strongly denied even interviewing with Oklahoma State or having spoken with Mike Gundy, much less accepting the defensive coordinator job.
Here’s what Herring told the Dallas Morning News and Fort Worth Star-Telegram yesterday.
Then, just for fun, here are a couple old stories on Herring, which were published couple weeks before he accepted an offer to be Texas A&M’s defensive coordinator last January. At the time, he was the interim head coach at Arkansas, which was preparing for the Cotton Bowl.
Here’s the first one, from the Morning News of Northwest Arkansas. Then this one ran in the Houston Chronicle a couple days later.
