‘Best DC Ever’: Clint Bowen Boosts Resume with Three-Week Run

STILLWATER — As interim coach Doug Meacham exited his final post-game presser, he shouted out a message to interim defensive coordinator Clint Bowen that, as his agent, he expects to take 5% commission on his next contract.

“That guy is all business, and he’s a hell of a football coach,” Meacham said of Bowen just seconds before his commission comment. “If I am (new OSU coach) Eric Morris, I might want to call him pretty quick because somebody is going to scoop him up quick. …

“That is winning defense, without a ton of depth, so my hat is off to him. He did a great job, and I’m kind of cheering for him, professionally, so I hope, I think he will have tons of opportunities next year.”

When Bowen took over the defense only nine weeks ago, he accepted quite the promotion, up from a quality control coach scouting opposing defenses to help the Cowboys’ offense. At the time, he was going through a soft reset of his collegiate coaching career following what Bowen described as a “career killer” decision to leave college athletics to serve as a coach for his sons at the high school level for four years.

On Saturday, Bowen could finally reframe that decision to prioritize his family years ago. As a high school coach, he had four spring periods to sit in on offensive meetings with various college coaches and pick their brains.

Then he showed up at Oklahoma State and watched Meacham install the offense during the offseason.

“(All of) that maybe improved me more as a defensive coach than my previous 15 years being a defensive coordinator (at a) Power Four school,” Bowen said. “Like it exposed me to truly what offensive guys are doing and how they’re doing it and why they’re doing it. … I didn’t have as much of an understanding as I thought, so in a lot of ways, being an offensive coordinator at the high school level and going to visit a lot of guys to learn how to be an offensive coach helped me tremendously to be a defensive coordinator.”

The Oklahoma State radio broadcast took time late in the game to praise Bowen’s group as “Big 12 competitive,” among other things, and Meacham even somewhat jokingly referred to him as “the greatest DC ever.”

The numbers the last three weeks more or less back all of that up.

Oklahoma State’s defense allowed the last three games:

The 12 defenses ranked ahead in points allowed are dominated by playoff locks and teams who entered the last week on the bubble including Ohio State, Indiana, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Miami, Oregon, Alabama, James Madison and Georgia.

The nine teams ahead on third down conversions is a little bit more of a mixed bag, but still includes playoff teams Texas A&M, Indiana, Oklahoma as well as bubble teams Miami and Virginia.

As eye-catching as those first two stats are, they look even better considering OSU entered the final game ranked 123rd and 125th nationally, respectively, after a season of mostly down moments heavily impacted the numbers.

Of course, the change that sparked the late turnaround was Oklahoma State’s late bye week earlier this month. It was the only off week that Bowen had to work with the defense and marked the first time the Cowboys were able to scout opponents after spending the rest of the fall either playing an old scheme that was struggling or installing a new scheme following his elevation to coordinator.

“Then you become a good football player,” Bowen said. “You start anticipating plays, seeing formations, and knowing things. So after the bye week, those guys, the ability to take the scouting report ahead was probably the biggest step that they made.”

Bowen’s defense did everything it could to end the season on a high note in the 20-13 loss to Iowa State. The Cowboys won 10-of-14 third downs and held Iowa State quarterback Rocco Becht to his second-lowest passing yardage total this season (119) on a 9-of-19 performance.

Even when Iowa State threatened to run the game out, OSU’s defense limited the Cyclones to a 4-play, 17-yard drive and an 8-play, 26-yard drive, both of which ended in punts.

As he did for the entire season, Bowen spent most of his time with the press on Saturday praising the players and the assistant coaches for sticking with him this season and not giving up despite multiple leadership changes, a long transfer portal window and the losses.

The coordinator also allowed himself to talk about his future. When asked if he would like to stay if the right opportunity presented itself on Morris’ staff, Bowen left no doubts.

“I love this place,” Bowen said. “This place has been really good for me and my family, my son is here. They gave me an opportunity. This is a unique place. … I haven’t been a ton of places in the college football world. I kind of had one or two stops, but I don’t know how it gets much better in this place.”