State of the Union: How Oklahoma State Fans Feel in Bedlam Aftermath

I broke one of my cardinal rules of blogging this week: I read the comments. Not all of them, but more than usual. And there were some gems, both good and bad. Bedlam brings out emotions on all sides. Some of that results in Facebook rants not fit for consumption by lab rats, and some of it results in thoughtful writing (both optimistic and pessimistic). I thought I would highlight the latter from a few readers and fans this week.

As always, we appreciate you reading this blog and consuming our stuff. It’s fun as hell to have a place for all of us to gather to commiserate and/or celebrate, and we’re thankful that you’ve chosen PFB as your place to do that.

Let’s get to the reader comments.

Alex F. (OU fan)

I mean all of this purely from a place of respect, and with as little condescension as possible. From the outside I think the greatest change I’ve seen in the culture of OSU football is that losing isn’t good enough. Mike Stoop’s defense held Ohio State in the Shoe to 16 points ( and OU turned over the ball 3 times in their own half of the field) and 7 weeks, and 6 wins later, I found myself, and OU fans everywhere at halftime saying to anyone who would listen that he should be fired Monday … You know for giving up 52 points but finding a way to get important stops and win against an offense with 5? 6? future NFL players. It’s irrational, it’s illogical, it’s short sided.

Up until Bedlam 2013 (and this blog) I’d really only seen the OSU fan base have moral victories in losses. Most of the whole ridiculous not a real rivalry shtick that some OU fans stick to that is clearly 15 years outdated is founded on that attitude. My experience with Bedlam growing up was a friend OSU fan walking up to me and saying “haha Texas/USC/LSU kicked your ass last night.” I’d watch OU win a hard fought game in Stillwater and have a friend be like “you guys suck, we almost beat you.”

In 2008 I realized my friend who was a big OSU fan and went to most every home game knew the name of more current OU players than he did OSU players. I say all of this to say that I see that 95% of that has dissipated from the OSU fan base. I think there are still the few that would rather go 8-4 and beat OU than go 10-2 and lose to OU, but it seems to me that the “OU problem” is more frustrating now because OU is standing in the way of OSU winning titles. Not because to be an OSU football fan is solely to be an anti-OU football fan.

That makes Bedlam a hell of a lot more fun, and I hope it stays this way, and the tradition of this rivalry builds. Respect for a great game and atmosphere Saturday.

Jason

This is the best Gundy will give us and it’s way better than most programs. Ask UCLA or Tennessee if they would love 10 win seasons. Heck we do better consistently than most programs. It means maybe when conferences change again that we don’t go with OU. Get away from them. We need another 10 years of consistency to move into that tier of program. I think we win the PAC 12 this year with this team. Gundy knows this too. Doesn’t mean we need to fire him. Remember OUs best teams lose to teams they overlook. They will not overlook us as long as we are good. We’ve beat OU when we weren’t good and they overlooked us or down years for them and good years for us in the same year. Nothing is changing. Next year they will be down some and we will be down a lot unless we get a new OC and the beat downs against OU will continue.

A Thread

6Gun: “There’s nobody in this stadium that’s more competitive than me,” said Gundy. “You want to go outside and wrestle. You want to play jacks. You want to shoot hoops. You want to play ping pong. I’m going to play until it’s over and somebody pulls me out of there.

It is clear from the above Gundy doesn’t understand competitive in mind, strategy, and thought. Winners are competitive in the mental aspect as well as the physical; Gundy cites wrestling, jacks, hoops, and ping pong, all physical. If OSU wants football championships and national titles then OSU needs a different head football coach. If OSU alumni and fans are happy going 8-4, 9-3, 10-2 then Gundy is your man; if the alumni want 13-0 then OSU needs a different head coach!

Pistolbill: I couldn’t agree more. We have the facilities, the boosters, the fans, and the players. We just don’t have the coach.

Jeff (the smart one of these three): Honestly I believe the complete opposite is true. Don’t have as much booster money as most teams competing for a NC. Have 1/4 of the fans of others competing for NC. Recruiting classes are consistently ranked in the 30’s. Gundy is the best thing of those four.

OSU Student

I’m just tired of every year, one aspect of our team completely no-showing in bedlam. It’s getting so old. It’s the old classic “fool me twice, shame on me” situation with Gundy. Except in our case, it’s “fool me 11 times.” How do I keep going into every season confident that we can beat OU? How do I go into every week thinking “If Kansas state and Baylor can almost beat them, we can definitely beat em”?

I swear, I’ve had just about every ounce of Bedlam confidence wiped out of me. And if that makes me a crappy fan/student, so be it. We can be 10-0 and OU can be 0-10 going into bedlam, and I still will have little to no confidence that we can get the job done. I can’t stand to listen to OU fans constantly chirp about “little brother,” but wouldn’t we be doing the same thing to them if they would have to sell their souls to the devil to beat us one time?? Good grief.

Yes, this feels like a rivalry, as far as atmosphere and bad blood goes. But as far as results go, it’s just another dominant team constantly hammering and bullying on the far inferior team. There has been little to no resistance in this rivalry, and even in the “greatest era in the history of Oklahoma state football” we have a 15% winning percentage against them (2/13). So our best stretch in program history cannot even beat them 20 percent of the time. We want to take the next step, compete for conference titles, complete for playoff spots, but we will never get there without beating OU. Which it looks like won’t be happening any time soon.

Scott

The crowd was absolutely on fire. The noise level after the fumble return for a TD was the loudest I’ve ever heard in BPS. This game was different. We have a lot of loser fans moping around whining that they are “done” investing in OSU, that we will never beat OU, blah blah blah bulls***. This was different. There was no curling into the fetal position here. There was no bulls*** “squinky.” This was just two good teams slugging the snot out of each other and an officiating crew that did all it could to take the crowd out early. This is the point where our fans decides where to go. We have to stop with this bullcrap, candy-assed, defeatist attitude that absolutely permeates the fan base. This isn’t the “last straw.” This is the game changer, if we want it to be.

Two4OSU

“You just tell us what you need. We’re gonna make this happen.’”

Oh my….

I think we’re literally on the edge of being that perennial top 10 team. Show me a time when a loss to OU would have only dropped us one spot in the polls, and that spot is still threatening to dive back into the top 10.

I know some are tired of hearing “we’re close,” but we are. Look what Gundy has done. Attendance in the 1990s was what, 30,000 a game? Listen, I sat in the stands the year we started out 6-0 by beating No. 24 Colorado in the rain, MAYBE 20,000 for that game and probably 8,000 after it started raining. It takes time, and consistently fighting and moving up in the polls so the talking heads can see OSU isn’t a flash in the pan.

Gundy is a media darling. He, along with our improved W-L record, has given us brand recognition, whether we want to acknowledge it or not. Most of this is inadvertent, even Gundy admits it, but it has happened because the media is enamored with him. And, Herbie excluded, the love follows.

This has been brought up recently, but all of us on here can remember when we were thrilled to be bowl-eligible. The fans’ expectations and the output of our team have both improved. We are watching Gundy change Cowboy football history and the perception of OSU football, be part of the progression.

JH

Love Gundy and where his heads at, I also really appreciated Boone Pickens comments after the game. It was literally one of my first thoughts after we lost as to how he would take it. I think I’m a little more cautious about where we are as a program …. we are good, I get it. But top 10 and who’s going to fall out for us to replace?

We have taken advantage of a wounded conference and a historically bad run at Texas, for that Gundy deserves credit, because a lot of people couldn’t have. Texas will be back, maybe not today and maybe not tomorrow, but it will happen. Lincoln Riley is the youngest HC in college football — they may actually get better. We have great facilities (others are catching up), great head coach (wouldn’t trade him for anyone), very good players, and solid coordinators. One of the last two variables has to become great or that window is going to get really tight.