Analysis: Oregon State erupted on offense to beat No. 25 WSU. At some point, that falls on coaching.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – Maybe the coaches are deploying a bad scheme. Maybe the players are making mistakes. Maybe the pass rush isn’t there. Maybe the entire operation is flawed, or maybe these guys just lose their mojo on the road, or maybe an alien is zapping these guys’ every ability.

There are tons of ways to dissect No. 25 Washington State’s latest loss, a 41-38 setback to Oregon State on Saturday evening at Reser Stadium, and many are just as confusing as the last. One theme has stayed the same throughout this entire season, though, and it’s at the heart of each of WSU’s last two losses: Head coach Jake Dickert and defensive coordinator Jeff Schmedding are falling woefully behind.

The Cougs’ coaching is costing this team dearly, particularly in the last two contests: A 38-35 road loss to New Mexico, which made no bones about its plan to use a running quarterback, and this defeat to Oregon State, whose 41 points are its most all season, more than its three previous games combined. After the game, Dickert said coaches expected OSU to use a similar QB keeper game with freshman Gabarri Johnson, and yet the Cougs could not stop it.

How else to explain OSU’s crucial fourth-down conversion in the fourth quarter, which resulted in WSU sophomore edge rusher Isaac Terrell guarding the Beavers’ top receiver, Trent Walker? How else to explain the outing of OSU quarterback Ben Gulbranson, who racked up 294 passing yards and two touchdowns, just two weeks after tossing no touchdowns and two interceptions in a loss to San Jose State?

How else to explain the consistently porous play from WSU’s safeties? To score one touchdown, the Beavers got tight end Jermaine Terry isolated against safety Tanner Moku, who has struggled in coverage this year. OSU set up another score by securing back-to-back big plays, one a 31-yard completion and the second a 24-yard pass. Opponents are realizing they can beat WSU over the middle of the field, where its safeties live, and the Cougs cannot find a way to remedy the issue.

Perhaps most important, how else to explain the invisibility cloak covering the Cougars’ pass rush, which allowed Gulbranson to sit in the pocket without much pressure at all? WSU totaled only two quarterback hurries, no sacks. The Cougs have rarely been able to generate pressure with four linemen all season, which is why Schmedding mixed things up earlier in the season, bringing pressure from all corners of the field.

None of that unfolded on Saturday night.

“They were just so far ahead of us on fourth downs,” said Dickert, whose team allowed Oregon State to convert each of its final fourth-down chances. “They were ahead of us on third down and obviously I thought we did a good job stopping their run game. They came out with (Johnson) and ran the same New Mexico play as last week. It’s what we thought they were gonna do.”

That brings up another question: What of Schmedding, whose defense allowed a moribund Oregon State offense to make Gulbranson look like a Heisman contender? At what point would Dickert consider making a change at defensive coordinator?

“These are all things I keep in-house,” Dickert said. “Just like anything else, I evaluate everything for the best of the team constantly, and I’ll continue to do that.”

At this point in the season, it’s clear Schmedding may not be the right man for the job, and it’s entirely possible Dickert and WSU will find someone new to fill the role. His 4-2-5 scheme is no match for mobile quarterbacks like New Mexico’s Devon Dampier and Oregon State’s Johnson. His defense remains one of the worst tackling outfits nationwide. Dickert has talked publicly about the way a lack of adjustments are leading to the Cougs’ troubles on defense, and you don’t have to squint very hard to see what – or who – he’s referencing.

But it isn’t so simple. Part of the unfortunate circumstances WSU finds itself in, left out of conference realignment and rebuilding a new-look Pac-12, comes back to money: Does the school have enough to part ways with Schmedding and hire a new defensive coordinator? Can WSU come up with the right dollar amount to find the right DC, one who’s better than Schmedding?

It’s entirely possible. But it also might be necessary. Maybe it would be one thing if opposing offenses were torching WSU’s defense in different ways every week: An Air Raid offense one week, a bruising running back the next, a run-it-down-your-throat approach the next.

But the Cougs have hit potholes on defense for the same reasons all year: They can’t defend dual-threat quarterbacks. Their safeties and nickels are a liability. Their tackling leaves much to be desired. Their communication falters when it matters most, like when the Cougs let receivers go in motion and immediately spring open, and when they end up with an edge rusher guarding a speedy wide receiver, both of which cost WSU dearly against Oregon State.

That’s a roundabout way of saying this: WSU is being beaten in ways it can turn around. That the Cougars cannot do it, among other things, says something about the quality of their coaching.

“They just didn’t do it the whole game,” Dickert said of OSU’s quarterback run game. “(Johnson) only played here and there a little bit, and they had some packages. They hit the speed option out the gate, which we just gotta execute that better. We were in bad position to get to the pitch, and bad alignment on that play. It was a variety of different things, and they weren’t just coming back to the same things.”

Dickert is right in that way. Gulbranson quarterbacked most of the game. But Dickert’s defense, which he said earlier this week he would involve himself more in, had seen that exact approach only a week prior. Dickert and Schmedding are smart enough to know OSU would use Johnson in some capacity, and they prepared for him to play, Dickert said this week. It didn’t seem to make much difference.

It isn’t all doom and gloom for WSU’s defense. Safety Tyson Durant made a huge play early on to knock away a third-down pass and force OSU into a field goal. Cornerback Ethan O’Connor grabbed an interception, his fourth of the season, and linebacker Buddah Al-Uqdah snagged a pick-six in the fourth quarter, his sixth takeaway in 11 games.

The Cougars could well have won this game. Maybe they do if senior receiver Kyle Williams, reliable all season, doesn’t lose a fumble on what could have been WSU’s go-ahead scoring drive. There are tons of what-ifs that could have tilted this one in favor of the Cougs, whose players scuffled at times, and there’s a difference between that and coaching errors. Not all the blame falls at Schmedding’s feet.

But 41 points is entirely too much to allow to the Beavers, who had made depleted offense their hallmark in their first 10 games of the season. In their 11th, they had no trouble breaking through, and that should say something about the Washington State coaches on the headsets. At some point, whether the players are making mistakes or their communication is suffering or whatever else, it all circles back to the guys in charge.