Mike Gundy Explains Why He Was So Happy for Taylor Cornelius on Saturday

Following a near game-winner in Norman over OU, Taylor Cornelius sealed the game against West Virginia this week with three Big Daddy™️ drives late in the fourth that ended, consecutively, with TDs from Tyron, himself and Tylan to beat WVU 45-41.

They came during a second half marked by offensive adjustments. OSU went four wide at halftime, and Gundy said that was no problem for his 24-year-old QB1.

“That’s the advantage with him,” said Gundy. “He made a couple throws, he got confused (in the first half). Things don’t bother him. That’s the position the position it has to be that way, but most young people aren’t that way. I say young, he’s 24, and that makes a difference. He stays even-keeled. We made essentially drastic changes at halftime. He was good with it. He understood it. We cut it loose and let it go.”

So when OSU scored on five of six drives in the second half, and Corn posted the third 300-100-5 game in Big 12 history, Gundy was pretty fired up about not only the way his super senior bounced back but also how he went out in Boone Pickens Stadium. Corn entered the Texas game with fans ready to boo him off the field, and he delivered victories over a pair of top 10 teams at home to end the season instead.

He almost delivered another one last week at OU, too.

“You could never see it, but you would think that inside (that OU loss) just tore him to pieces,” said Gundy. “For him to be able to finish this way is a big deal to me personally. Just from playing the position, the pressure. He’s just such a good kid — he’s not a kid, he’s a young man — he does everything you ask him all the time and never says a word.

“I could tell him right now to go run through that wall, he would until he gets through there. That’s just the type of young man he is. I’m happy for him that he could finish that drive.”

I loved that. We (I) get caught up in what this game means for legacies and financial trajectories and Big Picture Stuff and often forget about what it means for relationships and memories. Maybe nobody wants to hear about that regarding a business that generates $100 million in revenue every fiscal year, but it’s certainly fun to get a peek behind the curtain into a relationship and an infrastructure that is seemingly pretty fascinating.

Gundy wasn’t as emotional as he was last week following Bedlam, but he did appear to at least feel the magnitude of the moment both for Corn in this season and in his life. It was another pretty great evening to remember in BPS for somebody who has had more of them than anyone in Oklahoma State football history. And a final evening to remember for somebody who went out the right way for the last time on Lewis Field.

https://youtu.be/XBpHUUGX9yo?t=334