This is the Depth Dossier: the Colorado Buffaloes, Week 9.

Colorado finally has some good news at quarterback, and Isaac Wilson delivered it himself, leading the Buffaloes to a 27 to 24 overtime win over Kansas State that snapped a five-game losing streak.

The win came behind a ground game nobody saw coming. Running back Richard Young carried the ball 24 times for 120 yards and two touchdowns, wide receiver JaQuail Smith added 63 more yards, and Wilson threw for 185 yards and a touchdown without turning the ball over. Kansas State tied it late in regulation, but Colorado's defense held them to a field goal in overtime, and Wilson found tight end Charlie Williams for an 11-yard touchdown on third down to win it. It's Colorado's first Big 12 win of the season.

The box score makes it look comfortable. It wasn't. In the second quarter, running back DeKalon Taylor broke a 30-yard run that should have put Colorado up two scores, then fumbled it through the end zone for a touchback. Kansas State answered with an 80-yard scoring drive to tie the game, turning what looked like a blowout into a dogfight. It's the kind of mistake that's haunted this team all year.

The run game was the real surprise. Colorado hasn't won consistently up front all season, but they put up 222 rushing yards at better than five yards a carry against a tough Kansas State defensive line. Young, who hadn't carried this kind of workload before, became the workhorse while Wilson managed the game instead of trying to do everything himself.

On defense, linebacker Gideon Lampron had one of the best games anywhere in the country this week, with 15 tackles, four tackles for loss and two sacks. Defensive end Yamil Talib added eight tackles and two sacks of his own in a season-high workload. Between those two and the rest of the front, Colorado sacked Kansas State's backup quarterback five times.

It still wasn't clean. Colorado committed eight penalties for 53 yards, the same kind of untimely flags that have dogged them all year and let Kansas State hang around into overtime. But the defense held when it mattered, and Wilson played his first turnover-free game of the season when the team needed it most.

Now, the real story here started before kickoff. Quarterback Julian Lewis, who was set to start, suffered a medical emergency at the team facility and was hospitalized, ruling him out of the game. Wilson, who'd actually been benched the week before, stepped back in and played the most composed game of his season. Where that leaves the quarterback competition going forward hasn't been addressed, but Wilson just made about as strong a case as he could to keep the job.

Up front, the defensive line kept getting deeper. Santana Hopper and Dylan Manuel are both playing about three-quarters of the defensive snaps now, Toby Anene and Immanuel Ezeogu have expanded rotational roles, and Talib jumped all the way up to about half the snaps, which lines up with his breakout game. Samu Taumanupepe has faded into spot duty as that group gets crowded.

The secondary moved the other way. Defensive back RJ Johnson, who'd been playing around four-fifths of the snaps, dropped way down to spot duty, while Makari Vickers climbed into a three-quarter role. Naeten Mitchell and Cree Thomas both saw their snaps trimmed, and linebackers Gage Goldberg and Carson Crawford remain in limited roles.

Heading into next week, the thing to watch is simple. Is Lewis available again, and if he is, does Wilson's performance mean he keeps the starting job anyway?

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