Two missed field goals were the difference as No. 15 Oklahoma State lost their first game of the season Saturday, 21-24, against Iowa State in Ames, Iowa.

The loss put the Cowboys one game back of league-leading Oklahoma and tied with Iowa State and Baylor in the loss column in the Big 12.

In terms of a tiebreaker for the Big 12 Championship game, now Iowa State has beaten Oklahoma State, Oklahoma State has defeated Baylor and Baylor beat Iowa State.

The Cowboys host Kansas at 6 p.m. Saturday on Fox Sports1. KU fell to OU 23-35 Saturday in Lawrence.

With less than 2 minutes left Saturday, OSU was driving to tie the score with a field goal or take the lead with a touchdown when they failed to make a first down on a fourth down play near the ISU 40 yard line.

“I was really proud of our players,” said OSU coach Mike Gundy. “I told them in the locker room that their competitive nature and their willingness to compete throughout and fight. Early in the week we talked about when two good football teams go against each other, you’re going to exchange blows, just like we did last week. They’re gonna make a play, you’re gonna make a play, back and forth.

“And in the end, they made another play, one more than we did, came up just short on the fourth down, and so you give them credit…Basically an even game, no turnovers. We were down 30 yards in penalties, but we got the 30-plus yards back in returns. So, when you look at special team yards and penalty yards, it was pretty even, 332 to 374 yardage.”

The Cowboys missed two field goals.

Kicker Tanner Brown had plenty of distance on the kicks but he missed them. Gundy said he had confidence that Brown could hit a tying field goal late in the game.

“Well his range is there,” Gundy said. “The one he missed, he just missed it to the right a little bit. And that was 50ish. So, I’m OK with him.”

OSU managed to convert only 2 of 10 third downs. And the ISU quarterback had his best game.

“And obviously, we didn’t do a good job today, for whatever reason, of disrupting the quarterback,” Gundy said. “He got in a rhythm against us and started playing well. And he’s done that. There’s times people have talked about him not playing as good, you know, you read the media, but when he gets in a groove like he got into groove today, we couldn’t disrupt him much.”

OSU quarterback Spencer Sanders completed 15-of-24 passes for 225 yards and three touchdown passes. His three touchdown passes set a season high and marked his highest total since tossing a career-high four against Miami in the 2020 Cheez-It Bowl.

OSU’s Brennan Presley set season highs with six receptions, 84 receiving yards and two receiving touchdowns. The Iowa State game was his first multi-touchdown performance of the season. His only other career game with more than one touchdown was a three-touchdown effort in the 2020 Cheez-It Bowl.

Iowa State running back Breece Hall entered the game averaging 124.7 rushing yards per game. Oklahoma State limited him to 70 on 21 carries (3.3 yards per carry).

“Both teams have good defenses, and both teams have been good versus the run.” Gundy said. “It showed today. Early we were rushing the ball pretty well. Then they slowed us down some. And we started throwing it around very similar to what they did. Really pretty even. Again, I just kind of go back to they made the last play.”

The loss to Iowa State snapped Oklahoma State’s eight-game winning streak, which was the third-longest active streak in the nation. It also snapped the Cowboys’ four-game winning streak over the Cyclones in Ames.

Iowa State entered the game averaging 42.3 points and 488.5 yards of total offense in its last four games. The Cowboys held the Cyclones to 24 points and 374 yards. In its three games prior to playing Oklahoma State, Iowa State rushed for 216 yards against Baylor, 290 against Kansas and 210 against Kansas State. Against the Cowboys, the Cyclones had 67.

“They’re a very mature team,” Gundy said. “They’ve got a number of ‘super seniors.’ They’re a really veteran team, in my opinion the most veteran team in this league. As I said on Monday, they’re playing really good football and much better in the last month than they did to start the year.

“And I said this coming into the game, going into this weekend, if you just look at the teams in our league playing together in all three phases, they might be playing as good as anybody in our league now. Debatable. We knew this was gonna be a four-quarter game. We knew this was going to be a tough football game up here.”