After a bye week, Oklahoma State (4-2, 1-2 in the Big 12) is facing a trio of tough conference games that could shape their season.

OSU hosts No. 18 Baylor Saturday at 3 p.m., following by a trip to Iowa State on October 26 and a game against TCU in Stillwater on November 2.

OSU coach Mike Gundy said the off week was spent with his team working on “basic fundamentals, and getting a lot of quality reps for young guys who haven’t gotten as much work on game days.”

Baylor (6-0, 3-0 in the Big 12) is a challenge.

“They are a good football team,” Gundy said. “They’ve become a pure three-down defense. They are good football players. They are doing a lot of things differently coverage-wise from last year.

“Offensively, they got some skills on the perimeter but their quarterback is playing really well. He’s in his third year and now he’s figuring it out. He’s a good football player. He was always mobile, ran around and made some plays. He’s pretty accurate and pretty tough to deal with. You can tell he is experienced and he gets it. They are playing good football.”

The Red Raiders defeated OSU after the Cowboys suffered five turnovers.

“He needs to take care of the football in the pocket, that will solve half of his problems,” Gundy said of his quarterback Spencer Sanders. “We’re going to coach that and drill that. We have a plan in place to correct that mistake.

“Essentially, you don’t give yourself a chance at all when you turn the ball over in the pocket. Those mechanics need to be improved and we have a plan in place for that as well.

“Can we do that in two weeks? I don’t know. But I feel like a month from now, it will be a lot better. That’ll be a big help in that area.

“If you look at what happened, one ball got tipped and then intercepted. The other one got hit when he threw it. Now, I’m not trying to justify anything he did or we did offensively, but my job is to look at everything from a reasonable bipartisan point of view and make good decisions on it. Whether it’s true or not, I don’t know, it is what I do. So, he needs to learn to take care of the ball in the pocket and the rest of it will get better through the experience.”

Sanders threw three interceptions and fumbled twice against Texas Tech.

“You just tell him the truth,” Gundy said. “This is where it is, this is what happened and this is where you fix the issue. This is the plan we have in place and we’re going to start it right now.

“Hopefully we will improve considerably and faster than normal. It takes time to clean things up. We always just tell him the truth and where it is at. We need you to do these things to improve each week, and this guy needs to do these things to improve this week and put a plan in place. I always use the term ‘things don’t fix themselves.’ “So, we have a plan for improvement in all those areas and he’ll buy in. Sanders is a very prideful, emotional young man. He wants to do good every single play and what he has to learn is that quarterback is not that way. He needs to watch [other quarterbacks] and see how it happens and say ‘You know what? I’m going to get better. But I can’t make a play every single game, it’s just not the way the game is played.’ He’ll learn that, it just takes experience.”