WR Charlie Moore Lights Up Stat Sheet In OSU Spring Game

NewsOn6.com

STILLWATER, Oklahoma – The talk for the past few weeks around the OSU football program has been about which quarterback will be replacing Brandon Weeden.

But a possible replacement for receiver Justin Blackmon showed on Saturday why people should be talking about him as well.

Wide receiver Charlie Moore had a monster game at the Cowboys' spring finale as the Gray team came away with a 31-21 victory.

Moore, a junior, had nine catches for 243 yards and three touchdowns in the scrimmage. He has only caught seven passes for 114 yards and one score in his OSU career so far.

Coach Mike Gundy said even though it was still just a scrimmage, it's reasonable to be impressed with Moore's performance.

"Players compete and the guys that really want to make plays, they don't care what the situation is - they go out and play the game," he said. "It means a lot to me, the players that make plays out here today because this is as close as we can get to a game setting."

Though there was technically a final score, the scoring system was a little bit scrambled as the scrimmage stopped and started without the usual flow of an actual game.

Teams were split into the Orange and Gray rosters, and the Orange team jumped out to 24-0 lead at halftime. But Gundy switched up the score at halftime and the Orange team was forced to fight its way back into the lead it built.

The Orange team outscored the Gray 21-7 in the second half, resulting in an overall 31-21 Gray victory.

The story that everyone came into the day wanting to see unfold was the quarterback race.

Clint Chelf, J.W. Walsh and Wes Lunt all took snaps for both teams in the games, but their stats were still recorded.

Walsh had the biggest day with 310 yards on 16-of-27 passing. Chelf was 18-of-31 for 212 yards and Lunt was 15-of-23 for 215 yards. Each quarterback threw two touchdowns and none had an interception.

Gundy said he should be ready to make a decision on a starter at the position midway through next week.

"I thought that each quarterback at times showed signs of being good enough to start next year and I thought I saw at times there were some deficiencies with each one of them," Gundy said. "I'm meeting with the offensive staff on Wednesday. It should be shortly after that when we feel like we'll have our quarterback."

Finally, the defense had a solid day overall with 10 three-and-outs and two turnovers forced.

Defensive end Tyler Johnson and linebacker Caleb Lavey led the defenses statistically with five tackles each and Johnson added in a sack and fumble recovery.

Defensive coordinator Bill Young said he thought the defense played well overall.

"So much of it ties together," he said. "If you have good coverage the quarterback has to hold the ball longer and I think we got two or three coverage sacks today because we did have great coverage in our secondary and our linebackers. That's always a heck of a bonus."

Oklahoma State opens the 2012 season Sept. 1 against Savannah State.