Oklahoma State Hires Skyler Cassity as Defensive Coordinator

Eric Morris’ defensive coordinator is coming with him to Stillwater.

Oklahoma State officially announced the hiring of Skyler Cassity as its DC. CBS Sports’ Matt Zenitz reported the news earlier this week. Based off an old Sam Houston bio, it looks like Cassity will be 32 years old entering next season.

Morris and UNT had just hired Cassity ahead of the 2025 season away from Sam Houston.

Cassity shaved 9.2 points a game off the Mean Green’s total, as UNT gave up 34.1 points a game in 2024 and 24.9 this year. After giving up 460.5 yards a game in the year before Cassity’s arrival, North Texas allows 370.4 yards of total offense this season — a 90-yard difference.

Here’s a look at more of UNT’s 2024 numbers (before Cassity) and its 2025 numbers (with Cassity):

Sam Houston’s 2024 defense ranked 22nd in the FBS with Sam Houston going 10-3 and earning its first bowl victory in program history.

Cassity coordinated the Abilene Christian defense in 2022 and 2023 and has also spent time as a defensive position coach at Missouri State (2020-21). He was a student assistant at Auburn (2014-16), a graduate assistant at Texas State (2016) and a graduate assistant at Texas Tech (2017-19) on his way up to being a youthful defensive coordinator.

Cassity has more than one OSU tie. More recently, brother Braden Cassity was a Cowboy back under Mike Gundy from 2018-2023. Their father, Mike Cassity, was a defensive coordinator for Bob Simmons in the early 2000s.

This will be OSU’s sixth defensive coordinator in as many seasons — a trend that has to turn around at some point, right?

It started when Jim Knowles left for Ohio State after the 2021 season. OSU brought in Derek Mason for 2022. He left after one year, and Mike Gundy hired Bryan Nardo from the Division-II level. Nardo was axed after two seasons, as Gundy brought in Todd Grantham. Grantham was gone after only four games, and Clint Bowen was elevated to DC on an interim basis.