We Simulated Oklahoma State’s 2026 Season 100 Times, Here’s What Happened

After doing this the past two years, I’ve thought to myself, “I’m not doing that again,” but was a difference 12 months seems to make.

As has become a bit of a tradition since EA Sports has resumed making college football games, we’ve simulated Oklahoma State’s season 100 times on College Football 27.

Let’s get this out of the way early, this is not meant for anything other than a little July fun. It’s silly, I’m fully aware of that. Live a little.

If you’d like to look back at how the previous years went, here’s the 2024 season and 2025 season.

Without further ado, here’s what happened when we simulated Oklahoma State’s 2026 season 100 times.

Overview

Average regular season wins and losses: The Cowboys, on average, went 5.7-6.3 during the regular season in this exercise.

For reference, when we first did this ahead of the 2024 season, it came out to an average of 8.1-3.9 — just for the Cowboys to finish that season 3-9. Then last season, the game had OSU’s average at 4.2-8 before OSU went 1-11. Important to note, I included bowl games in previous years’ records but didn’t this year because there were many instances where OSU would win six games (or more) and not get in a bowl.

Chances of winning X games: Speaking of bowls, OSU won at least six regular season games in 56% of the simulations. Here’s how that breaks down further (again, only regular season wins):

at least one win — 100%
at least two wins — 100% (better than last year)
at least three wins — 98%
at least four wins — 91%
at least five wins — 76%
at least six wins — 56%
at least seven wins — 31%
at least eight wins — 14%
at least nine wins — 6%
at least 10 wins — 1%
more than 10 wins — 0%

Big 12 Title Chances: OSU won one Big 12 title in these simulations (Sim 74) and made it to the title game on two other occasions, losing to BYU in both instances. We’ll break down where the rest of the Big 12 titles went here in a bit.

College Football Playoff Chances: The Cowboys twice made the College Football Playoff First Round, losing in both of those instances. One was Sim 74, where OSU won the Big 12. The other was Sim 5, where OSU lost in the Big 12 title game to BYU after a 10-2 regular season.

Bowls the Pokes went to: As noted, there were instances OSU would win enough games to be bowl eligible then not be selected for a bowl. I’m guessing the game doesn’t have enough bowls available for all the possible six-win teams.

With that said, there were 46 instances of OSU making a bowl. Here’s a breakdown of the bowls:

College Football Playoff First Round — two times (0-2)
Alamo Bowl — five times (4-1)
Pop-Tarts Bowl — four times (2-2)
Texas Bowl — seven times (0-7) (one was a loss to OU)
Liberty Bowl — four times (1-3)
Rate Bowl — nine times (2-7)
Frisco Bowl — six times (4-2) (one was a win against North Texas)
Independence Bowl — five times (4-1)
New Mexico Bowl — four times (2-2)

Game-by-Game Percentages

Here’s a look at OSU’s game-by-game win percentages:

at Tulsa — 77%
Oregon — 17%
FCS (Murray State) — 97%
at West Virginia — 63%
UCF — 40%
at Houston — 46%
Colorado — 37%
at Iowa State — 55%
at Kansas State — 31%
Texas Tech — 27%
at Arizona State — 32%
Kansas — 52%

Notes: 

After being in Eugene last September, I’ll take a 17% chance of something wild happening because boy, that was ugly.

The two most surprising percentages from that chart for me were Colorado and Kansas State. You’ll see here shortly how much the simulation loved K-State. Although Colorado won just one Big 12 title during these sims, they had the Pokes’ number in Stillwater. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it was like 50/50, but 37% seemed low if you ask me.

Big 12 Champion Percentages

Here’s a look at which teams won Big 12 titles and how many. First, in written form, then in a nice graph:

BYU — 33
Texas Tech — 31
Kansas State — 16
Utah — 10
Baylor — 2
Houston — 2
UCF — 2
Arizona — 1
Arizona State — 1
Colorado — 1
Oklahoma State — 1

Notes: 

See, I told you the sims loved Kansas State. For reference, K-State is fifth in FanDuel odds to win the league this season.

BYU and Texas Tech accounting for 64% of league titles tracks, though I imagine many would’ve picked Tech to finish with the most. You wonder how much the Sorsby situation late in the game’s production cycle might’ve messed with things.

Notable Simulations

Darkest Timeline: Sim 4

There were two simulations in which OSU finished 2-10. I give the darkest timeline nod to Sim 4 because it would involved, for a second straight season, the Cowboys losing to Tulsa. OSU’s only wins in Sim 4 were against FCS (Murray State) and at Houston.

Brightest timeline: Sim 74

OSU finished the regular season of Sim 74 at 9-3, which isn’t their highest win total of these simulations, but this simulation gets the nod because it’s where OSU won the Big 12. It also included a cheeky win against Texas Tech. The only regular season losses were to Oregon, at Houston and home vs Kansas.

Somewhat Realistic Optimism: Sim 34

Sim 34 wasn’t the Cowboys’ best simulation, but it might’ve made the most optimistic sense of any of these whacky things.

It saw OSU have a 9-3 regular season with losses to Oregon, at Houston and Texas Tech. Tech would go on to win the league, while OSU would suffer a defeat in the Texas Bowl. Still, solid year considering the previous two seasons.

Weird Ones:

Sim 99 — OSU went 6-6 in the penultimate simulation by starting off 6-0 (including a win against Oregon) before losing six straight. I’m not sure what I’d think about a season like that.

Sim 69 — OSU went 4-8, losing to Tulsa and Murray State but beating Oregon. It was one of three instances where OSU lost to Tulsa but beat Oregon but the only where OSU lost to Murray State while beating Oregon.

Sims 24 and 29 — Both of these simulations saw OSU go 7-5 but beat Oregon and Texas Tech. That might feel like the 2018 season when Taylor Cornelius led OSU to wins against Texas and that solid West Virginia squad while otherwise being rather average.