Gundy Says Oklahoma State Will Play Multiple Quarterbacks, Maybe for ‘Quite a While’

STILLWATER –Thursday wasn’t the first time this offseason that Mike Gundy has discussed the potential of playing multiple quarterbacks in 2023, but Thursday did sound more definitive.

Gundy held his first media luncheon of the year Thursday in the press box of Boone Pickens Stadium, where he said Oklahoma State will play multiple quarterbacks, and it might not just be the Cowboys’ Sept. 2 season opener against Central Arkansas.

“We will play multiple quarterbacks — maybe for quite a while, I’m not sure,” Gundy said.

“… Not that I have to bring any witnesses to the table, but you could ask the five, six, seven, eight people that watch us practice all the time — it would be really hard to name one guy and say, ‘OK, he deserves to play more than the others.’ It would be extremely difficult. So I have an obligation, we have an obligation to the team, which we’ll try to do the best we can. And we have an obligation to the members on our team to give everybody and opportunity.”

Alan Bowman, Garret Rangel and Gunnar Gundy were all together on OSU’s first depth chart of the season, intertwined with two of the 16 ORs on the two-deep.

A transfer who has spent time at Texas Tech and Michigan, Bowman is the most experienced of the bunch, having thrown for 4,371 more yards in his career than Rangel and Gundy put together. However, Bowman doesn’t have experience in OSU’s system.

Rangel and Gundy were tasked with learning on the go last season, each starting in place of an injured Spencer Sanders throughout the year. That baptism via fire was made all the more difficult because the Cowboys’ running game struggled mightily in 2022, which put more on their inexperienced shoulders.

Mike Gundy said each of the three has gotten a lot of reps this offseason, making him comfortable to play more than one guy.

“You’ll get it from different sides,” Gundy said. “People will say, ‘Your team doesn’t know who your leader is. Your team doesn’t know who the quarterback is. It creates confusion.’ I don’t believe that at all. Maybe I would have bought that two or three years ago, but I don’t believe that at all.

“I would think that at the most after a few games we would be able to maybe settle in. … Put yourself in my shoes. If you have multiple guys that are close and you think they can help you win, why would we treat them any different than we do the wide receivers?”

Multiple doesn’t mean three — it just means more than one. When asked whether two or three quarterbacks will play, Gundy said it could “very well be three,” but he didn’t commit to a hard number.

Gundy was also asked whether there would be a plan going in as to who plays when. He didn’t share any details of such a plan but said that would be ideal.

“That’s been talked about, and the good news is I don’t have to make that decision right now,” Gundy said. “We don’t have to make that decision right now. I’m leaning toward when we go in the game, we’ll have a plan so at least there’s some sort of communication and guys know what to expect. We all know this — you watch a lot of college football — it’s the only position that players don’t rotate in. Every other position, guys rotate in and nobody ever talks about it. I would like to have a plan going in and say, ‘This is what we’re gonna do.’ That way those involved mentally know what’s in front of them.”