As if it wasn't already obvious as Friday night turned into Monday afternoon, but Mike Gundy will not be stepping down as Oklahoma State's head coach. At least not in the foreseeable future.
"I'm under contract here for about three and a half years," Gundy said Monday. "When I was hired here to take this job, ever since that day I've put my heart and soul into this and I will continue to do that until at some point if I say I don't want to do it, or if somebody else says, 'We don't want you to do it.'"
Oklahoma State lost 19-12 to Tulsa on Friday night, the Cowboys' first home loss to the Golden Hurricane since the school was known as Oklahoma A&M, back in 1951. That loss came on the heels of a 69-3 defeat at Oregon, and overall OSU's losing streak against FBS competition stretches back to 11 games. The Cowboys' last defeat of an FBS foe came Sept. 14, 2024, in a 45-10 win over Tulsa.
In his 21st season on the job, Gundy said he has not been discouraged by all the losing Oklahoma State has done in the past year, nor is he worn down by the grind of 36 years in coaching, most of that as a head coach. On the contrary, in fact. Gundy said Monday that he's more motivated by losing than winning.
"If we win I might come in on Sunday at 8:30, if we lose I'm probably in by 5 a.m. just because I feel better doing that," he said. "I feel like I'm trying to figure out why and what happened and put together a good plan, because I have 150 people in the building waiting on me to give them a response and an answer. I love what I do. I have the exact same amount of energy that I've had from day one."
In Oklahoma State's case, he says he saw five to six issues that led to Friday night's loss, all of them fixable. The offense needs to continue allowing redshirt freshman Zane Flores to settle into his role as the team's starting quarterback. The receivers need to do a better job of watching the ball into the tuck. Of the six tackles Cowboy defenders missed, four were because their eyes were down upon contact.
"If you clean some of those up, it makes a difference. That part I really enjoy," Gundy said.
For the faction of Oklahoma State fans wishing Gundy would move on, well, he's not. So, unless Gundy rapidly loses the vigor for the job that he says is still in full supply, either Oklahoma State will improve its play or someone higher than him on the food chain will need to tell (and pay) Gundy to move on.
"There's never, ever become a time that I haven't wanted to come to work and pour my heart and soul into what I do, for the players. That has never come about... I get text messages all the time, 'What are you doing? Why are you doing this?' It is still fun for me."