Mike Gundy on SEC Recruiting ‘Texas is Big 12 Country, Period’

The oft-reported and much-anticipated demise of the Big 12 has yet to completely come to fruition. Some might even say things are turning the corner for the better. At least that seems to be the case in the most fertile recruiting territory this side of the Mississippi.

ESPN’s Jake Trotter wrote a great piece that you should read about the Big 12 and its re-staking its claim in Lone Star recruiting. In it the ever-quotable bastion for fly-over football, Mike Gundy gave several gems.

“It’s pretty simple: The shiny new product of the SEC wore off,” Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy told ESPN.com while likening SEC recruiting in Texas to the recent fad of the hoverboard. “Everybody rode them around for two or three years — now you don’t see them anymore. The newness has worn off.”

Mike Gundy knows a thing or two about about staying ahead of the curve. Besides hoverboards are so three years ago.

Mike Gundy's hoverboard skills > Mike Tyson's hoverboard skills

WATCH: https://t.co/PNm6yDwEDU pic.twitter.com/vOHBTIi5G0

— Kyle Boone (@PFBoone) December 30, 2015

“The players we recruit, when it first happened, when A&M jumped over, it was, ‘OK, I’m infatuated with LSU or Ole Miss or Mississippi State or whatever,’” Gundy said. “We’re not seeing that as much anymore. We’re seeing that we’re back to competing against the people in this part of the country. That’s the direction it’s going.”

And the numbers do back that up. As brought up in the article, only three of the Top 30 2018 recruits in Texas are currently signed on to SEC  schools — and two of those are staying in-state with Texas A&M.

Mike Gundy seems confident that the Texas pipeline will continue to flow north into Stillwater, and to to the rest of the Big 12 cities.

“The state of Texas is Big 12 country, period,” Gundy said. “I think you’re going to see that … the product of the SEC has worn off.”

Will this sudden turn in the recruiting tide translate into some righting of the ship for the Big 12? And if so, does that benefit the Oklahoma States of the world or will the likes of Oklahoma and Texas reap most of the reward? That remains to be seen but for now Mike Gundy is doing his part by remaining in the headlines.