J.W. Walsh’s two-yard touchdown run in overtime gave Oklahoma State a 33-26 victory over West Virginia Saturday night at Milan Puskar Stadium.

 

“Another tough loss to another top-20 team,” said West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen. “We didn’t start very good, got ourselves in a big hole, but I really commend our players for coming in at halftime, we challenged them obviously, and they came out in the second half, played a lot better and got it to a point where we could win. But at the end of the day it was just not good enough.

 

“You’ve got to put together four good quarters in the Big 12 to win football games and right now we are not capable of doing that,” added Holgorsen.

 

The No. 21 Cowboys (6-0) capitalized on three West Virginia turnovers to stake themselves to a 17-2 halftime lead.

 

Defensive end Emmanuel Ogbah fell on a Skyler Howard fumble in the end zone to give Oklahoma State an early 7-0 advantage. Then the Cowboys added another touchdown at the start of the second quarter following a Rushel Shell fumble at the West Virginia 28.

 

Five plays later, Rennie Childs bounced in from the one to give the Cowboys a two-touchdown edge.

 

Another West Virginia turnover on its ensuing possession didn’t lead to Cowboy points, but it did take likely points off the scoreboard.

 

 

West Virginia marched from its own 26 to the Oklahoma State 15. Following a short Shell run, Wendell Smallwood got into the open for first-down yardage before he was stripped from behind by Chad Whitener. Jordan Sterns recovered the loose ball at the five.

 

From there, that set up West Virginia’s only first-half points when defensive tackle Kyle Rose broke free and sacked Mason Rudolph in the end zone. Replay confirmed that Rudolph’s knee was down when he tried to get the ball out of the end zone.

 

The only other first-half points came on a Ben Grogan 21-yard field goal with 3:43 remaining.

 

“When we did get things going in the first half those drives ended in fumbles,” said Holgorsen. “It wasn’t just one person. If I could have put one person on the bench because of it, I would.”

 

West Virginia came alive at the beginning of the third quarter, marching 61 yards in seven plays, culminating with Smallwood’s 29-yard touchdown run.

 

Two possessions later, Oklahoma State had its best drive of the second half, going from its own 14 into the end zone. The Cowboys were aided by two West Virginia penalties and a blown defensive assignment that enabled Rudolph to run 40 yards to the WVU 28 before he was knocked out of bounds.

 

Childs added 13 yards to the WVU 15, a Rudolph-to-David Glidden seven yard pass and a face mask penalty on Noble Nwachukwu gave the Cowboys a first and goal at the four. Three plays later, Walsh hit Jarwin Blake in the back of the end zone for a touchdown, giving Oklahoma State a 23-9 lead.

 

West Virginia answered on the next possession when, on second and five from the OSU 48, Howard fired an high-arching pass down the near sideline to Shelton Gibson for a touchdown.  Gibson had gotten behind Ashton Lampkin and safety help overtop was late getting there.

 

That Howard-to-Gibson hookup made it 23-16, Oklahoma State.

 

 

The two teams traded field goals early in the fourth quarter, Josh Lambert punching his in from 38 yards with 13:50 to go to make it a four-point game, and then the Cowboys got theirs eight minutes later after linebacker Devonte Averette picked off Howard’s pass intended for Jordan Thompson at the WVU 30 and returned it 11 yards to the 19.

 

Three ineffective runs led to Grogan’s 22-yard field goal with 5:36 remaining in the game.

 

After Gibson returned Grogan’s kickoff from the end zone to the Mountaineer 32, West Virginia got a free 10 yards when Michael Hunter was called for defensive holding on Howard’s attempted pass.

 

Howard hit Gibson for eight yards to midfield; Shell got five on the ground to the 45 and two more Shell runs got first-down yardage to the OU 35.

 

Howard completed an 11-yard pass to Thompson out in the flat to the Cowboy 24; Howard ran for 10 yards to the 14 and eventually called his own number from the three where replay confirmed he had reached the end zone instead of being down at the one.

 

Lambert’s PAT tied the game with 2:44 left.

 

Following Nick O’Toole’s kickoff, which was downed in the end zone, Oklahoma State got two first downs, moving the football out to the Cowboy 41. However, on third and 10, Glidden was unable to hold on to Rudolph’s pass along the far sideline forcing a Zach Sinor punt, which sailed out of bounds at the WVU nine with only 58 seconds showing on the clock.

 

Two Smallwood runs gave West Virginia a first down at the 23, and a Howard-to-Durante screen pass took the football to the 33. However, Howard was sacked on the next play and a leg-whip penalty on center Tyler Orlosky put the ball back at the WVU 16 with only nine seconds left.

 

At that point, with the offense going in reverse, Holgorsen chose to run out the clock to send the game into overtime.  

 

West Virginia won the toss and elected to go on defense to begin the overtime. Three Child runs netted 16 yards to the nine, and three plays later on fourth and goal from the two, Walsh took it in untouched to retake the lead. All 25 yards in overtime for the Cowboys came on the ground.

 

West Virginia’s overtime possession began with a Shell five-yard run, and two plays later on fourth down, he ran for eight yards and a first down to the Cowboy nine.

 

The critical play in overtime occurred on third and goal from the four when Shell chose to bounce his run to the outside where he was met by Jordan Burton and Tre Flowers for a seven-yard loss.

 

“They had nine people in the box and that’s one more than us,” said Holgorsen. “I could have thrown it to the outside but their corners can cover pretty good so we decided to try and hit the run. It was in our game plan to run it on third down, but we really didn’t want it to be third and (four on the four-yard line) in overtime against a stacked box.

 

“We could have done something with the pass options we have against a stacked box – we did it twice – in the overtime and we weren’t successful either time.”

 

That put the Mountaineers in a fourth-and-goal situation from the 11, where Oklahoma State was able to get enough pressure on Howard to force an errant throw to Daikiel Shorts Jr. in the back of the end zone.

 

Those remaining from the 60,410 attending tonight's game watched in stunned silence.

 

Rudolph completed half of his 40 pass attempts for 218 yards with three interceptions, and was also Oklahoma State’s leading ground gainer with 48 yards. Rudolph is now 8-0 as Oklahoma State’s starting quarterback dating back to last season.

 

West Virginia (3-2) got 147 yards and a touchdown on the ground from Smallwood, while Howard completed 18 of his 35 pass tries for 188 yards and a touchdown.

 

Gibson led all receivers with 84 yards on five receptions.

 

“We’re somewhat struggling (to throw the football) completion-percentage wise and with some inexperienced receivers,” noted Holgorsen. “Guys have got to improve. I thought the protection improved throughout the game, but we’ve got to get receivers to run routes and a quarterback that can get settled and throw accurate balls. There is a lot that goes into it.”

 

West Virginia outgained Oklahoma State 443-362, but the Cowboys had the bigger number in the stat category that counts the most – points on the scoreboard.

 

The loss was West Virginia’s second straight  in a difficult stretch of four consecutive games against ranked Big 12 foes. And it only gets tougher with back-to-back road games coming up at No. 3 Baylor next Saturday followed by a Thursday night game at second-ranked TCU 12 days later at the end of the month.

 

Oklahoma State is back home to face Kansas on Saturday, October 24.