Oklahoma State is in a strategic position to win the Big 12 Championship and earn a spot in the College Football Playoff.

Behind their staunch defense, the Cowboys beat West Virginia 24-3 Saturday in Morgantown and to move up in the national rankings to No. 10.

Oklahoma State (8-1, 5-1 Big 12) will host  TCU at 7 p.m. Saturday on Fox for the Cowboys’ Homecoming. The Jayhawks fell to in-state rival Kansas, 10-35, last Saturday.

Moving on, OSU will be favored against TCU and in a road game against Texas Tech and have   a pretty even match on November 27 when they host No. 4 Oklahoma.

The Cowboys’ only loss was a three-point defeat against Iowa State in Ames, Iowa.

It would take a series of upsets for OSU to make the playoff. First, the need to win their next three games and win a potential rematch with Oklahoma in the Big 12 Championship. Back-to-back wins over a Top 10 team (OU) would be a big plus. And should No. 3 Alabama lose to No. 1 Georgia, the Tide would be out. No. 4 OU would be out. No. 5 Oregon might need to lose. No. 6 Ohio State still has to play No. 8 Michigan State and No. 9 Michigan. Michigan still must play Ohio State and Penn State. And Notre Dame could lose style points because they don’t have a conference championship game.

Five key losses and a 12-1 Oklahoma State could slip into the playoffs.

Saturday’s win impressed West Virginia Head Coach Neal Brown.

“They beat us soundly today,” Brown said. “It was easily seen by everybody in this room. The game’s hard. The league’s hard. What a difference a week makes. We probably played our best football game a week ago, and (this) was a struggle all day. It was a field position game that we lost badly…

“If you look at Oklahoma State’s scoring drives (they were) all short fields, and we played good enough to win on defense. I think if you just saw Oklahoma State’s stat line against the yards, you’d say okay, the other team has a chance.

“They were clearly better than us today. (Oklahoma State coach) Mike (Gundy) and his crew have done a really good job for an extended period of time. They were able to not allow negative plays on their end for the most part, even though we were able to get some pressure on the quarterback. They took advantage of the mistakes.”

OSU quarterback Spencer Sanders threw two touchdown passes while the Cowboy defense had 11 sacks as OSU won their seventh straight game against West Virginia. OSU receiver Tay Martin had two touchdown receptions.

A week before, the Mountaineers beat Iowa State. The OSU defense held them to 133 total yards, including only 17 yards rushing.

“That was a pretty impressive defensive performance by our guys,” said OSU coach Mike Gundy. “I was shocked, to be honest with you, that we could play that well defensively against them (West Virginia) on the road. (That’s) as well as they’ve played offensively the last two weeks. They’ve been good up front, rushed the ball well, their quarterback has played well. I told our team that offensively, we should have had 35 points. We shot ourselves in the foot too many times by dropping a pass here or a penalty to set ourselves back. We had 35, but we just didn’t get to it. It was a self- inflicted wound.”

In its last two games, Oklahoma State held Kansas to three points and West Virginia to three. It’s the first time since the final game of 1974 and the first game of 1975 that OSU held consecutive opponents without a touchdown and was the first time since 1948 and 1949 that OSU held consecutive conference opponents without a touchdown.

“Defensively, we just dominated the game. I don’t know what else to say,” Gundy said.

This was Sanders’ 20th as Oklahoma State’s starting quarterback. The only other OSU QBs with 20 or more career wins as a starter are Mason Rudolph (32), Mike Gundy, (28), Brandon Weeden (23) and Zac Robinson (23).

“We could’ve played better offensively, but we need to eliminate some of our mistakes to give ourselves a better chance,” Gundy said.

OSU’s conditioning paid off.

“I also think this is a big win for us in the weight room,” Gundy said. “I felt, as I said Sunday, that this team (West Virginia) might have been the most physical team in our league at this particular time, especially after how they played against Iowa State, who is a fairly physical team in our conference.

“It showed that our guys in the weight room were much further ahead and were able to move those guys around up front on both sides of the ball. At times we rushed the ball effectively and other times we shot ourselves in the foot. It’s a good win for everybody.”