The Top Five Quotes from Mike Gundy’s Pre-UT Martin News Conference

STILLWATER — Mike Gundy held his first media luncheon of the 2025 season on Thursday. All that’s left to do is kick off.

Gundy opened his news conference by saying he didn’t have any roster updates to share, which meant there was hardly any talk on specific players. Here are five things that stood out from Gundy’s Thursday comments. The full video of his news conference is below.

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1. Setting Expectations

With a new coaching staff and almost an entirely turned over roster, it’s hard from the outside to set expectations for what this Cowboy team can become in 2025.

How does that look from the inside?

“Well, I don’t have to (set expectations),” Gundy said. “Doesn’t make a difference anymore, right? You know, I’ve said this for years up here early in the season, it’s a good thing you get to play them all, and if you keep winning, you get to go further. And if you lose, you get dropped back. And so we have expectations for our team for this game, and then those expectations should improve for the next game and the next week and the next week and on down the road. 

“That’s the one thing that in this organization for 20 years that I have always stressed our team needs to improve each week. If not, there should be a good reason why. Maybe we have injuries at key spots or so on and so forth. But otherwise, our team should improve each week. That’s what my expectations are.”

2. A ‘Very Physical’ Fall Camp

With all the moving parts from this offseason, Gundy tested his team’s physicality in fall camp.

It sounds like this group showed him what he was looking for.

“We were very physical in camp,” Gundy said. “We actually backed off a little bit earlier than normal because I felt like we were in a position that we should be. Every year it’s different based on who you are and who your players are and what the maturity is, and so on and so forth. I was able to get a pretty good feel for our football team over the first two weeks, maybe the first 12 practices or so. And then we do have a considerable number of players that will be playing for us that are veteran players. They are just not veterans here at Oklahoma State. And so my history is when I see that, and I see a guy that I’m pretty sure is going to be able to compete on a physical level, then I have to be a little bit careful about how much we do it preseason. 

“Because whether you like it or not, in my opinion, you have to think about where you’re going to be in October. Because it’s not right now, it’s preparing for avoiding fatigue in October and November, which is what happens if you front load them.”

3. The Ideal Running Back Split

Despite losing Ollie Gordon to the NFL, the Cowboys’ running back room might be deeper in 2025 than it was in 2024.

Transfers Kalib Hicks (OU) and Freddie Brock (Georgia State) join a returning trio of Trent Howland, Rodney Fields Jr. and Sesi Vailahi as players expected to compete to carry the rock for the Cowboys this year. This isn’t the first time OSU has had a deep tailback room — think back to the year OSU had Justice Hill, Chuba Hubbard, LD Brown and J.D. King all in the backfield.

As for how the workload shakes out, it sounds as if Gundy is keeping his options open.

“We’ve done it different ways,” Gundy said. “There’s times we’ve had a dominant running back it has been really good and guys that come in and give them a few reps. There’s been years where we’ve had guys that are almost equal in reps. We just need to be productive and need to stay healthy. One issue of running back, in my opinion, is keeping those guys healthy. Take so many direct hits.”

4. It Doesn’t Sound Like Gundy Is Signing Up for the Ireland Game Anytime Soon

The Big 12 kicks off the college football season on Saturday when Farmageddon goes international.

Kansas State and Iowa State kick off at 11 a.m. (Central) Saturday in Dublin, Ireland. A Week 0 game in Ireland is starting to become a tradition. Georgia Tech beat Florida State in Ireland last season with College GameDay making the trip across the pond.

By the sounds of it, it’d take some convincing to get Gundy and his Cowboys over the Atlantic.

“Oh gosh,” Gundy said before looking to the ceiling. “My wife would probably want to do it. She’d want to go over in June for the August kickoff. I don’t know. That’s a lot. I would worry about just everything going on. I know it’s distractions for both teams, but I don’t know, that would be an issue. We talked about playing in Mexico one time but not quite so far on the plane flight.”

5. On NBA Champion Mark Daigneault

In the past, Oklahoma City Thunder coach Mark Daigneault has made the voyage up I-35 to sit in on some of Gundy’s practices.

He obviously coaches a different sport, but Gundy said he was impressed with the now-NBA champion coach.

“I think they did an unbelievable job,” Gundy said. “I don’t watch a lot of games. It’s too late at night for me most of the time, but when he was coming, hanging around practice here, he was very impressive and his willingness to come to another sport and watch and learn and ask probably 15 questions the times he’s been here of why we do this and why do that, I’m guessing his ability to relate coaching and practices to another sport must be beneficial for him.

“If so, the one thing I remembered in the times he’s been here is it’s impressive he can take that and relate it to whatever he does if that’s the way he was using.”