Tulsa World: Football on the brain

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Football on the brain
In contrast to a drama-riddled 2007 season, OSU coach Mike Gundy focuses solely on the game

Mike Gundy shares a laugh during a weekly press conference this season. MICHAEL WYKE/Tulsa World

By BILL HAISTEN World Sports Writer
Published: 12/26/2008 2:26 AM
Last Modified: 12/26/2008 2:57 AM

SAN DIEGO — Everybody has an occasional tough day on the job.

For Mike Gundy, 2007 qualified as a tough year on the job.

"There was a lot going on," Gundy recalls. "Last year, in the three weeks before the bowl game, it was as stressed out as I've ever been."

Drama permeated the 2007 Oklahoma State season. Gundy had the lead role. Additional cast members included Bobby Reid, the Troy Trojans, an Oklahoma City media member, Chris Collins and the Texas Longhorns.

Gundy became nationally recognized as the YouTube star of a press-conference tirade — his calculated, emotional chewing-out of an Oklahoman sports writer. A national columnist described it as "the mother of all meltdowns."

By the end of a second consecutive 7-6 season, his three-year head-coaching record was one game below .500.

"I could see that Mike was going through a very difficult time, but he never complained and never brought it home," said Kristen Gundy, Mike's wife. "He just wanted everything to settle down. He stood strong, and I was very proud of him. He just wanted to focus on football."

Said Cowboy tight end Brandon Pettigrew: "You know (Mike Gundy) is stressed, but he didn't show it last year or this year. He comes to practice and he's ready to work. He's on top of his game every day."

To Gundy's relief, 2008 has been all about football — for the most part, high-scoring, big-yardage, winning football.

"We've had a lot of good things happen for us," he said.

Gunter Brewer and Trooper Taylor are designated as co-offensive coordinators, but Gundy is heavily involved in offensive game-planning and coaching. During games, he calls the plays. OSU is seventh nationally in total offense, seventh in rushing and eighth in scoring.

The 13th-ranked Cowboys (9-3) have been in the Associated Press poll for nearly three months, and on Tuesday they face the 15th-ranked Oregon Ducks in the Holiday Bowl at Qualcomm Stadium.

There has been no controversy in Stillwater this year. As OSU bids for the fourth 10-win season in school history, Gundy's reputation seems healthy. Head-coaching positions at Clemson and Tennessee were open, and it is believed that officials at both schools viewed Gundy as a possible candidate.

At OSU, Gundy recently was given a new contract — seven years, $15.7 million.

Gundy becomes the only man to have been a Holiday Bowl participant both as a player and a head coach. In 1988, he quarterbacked the Cowboys to a 62-14 Holiday Bowl triumph over Wyoming.

"When we have fun, we play better," OSU linebacker Andre Sexton says. "This year, everyone has been more loose — coach Gundy included."

When practice has ended, Cowboy players and coaches form a circle, rhythmically clapping and singing and chanting. Many of the players and some of the assistant coaches dance at the center of the circle.

This year, Gundy finally relented.

He danced.

Sexton says the dance was dubbed "The Gundy." Sexton says teammate Terrance Anderson can do a perfect imitation of "The Gundy."

Sexton's description of Gundy's dance: "It's old-school. He shows his flexibility. His legs kind of bend in. He's done it on more than one occasion. Everybody cheers him on."

Gundy is the father of three young sons, but family time is extremely limited from August through December (when work days typically begin at 6 a.m. and end at 10 p.m.). Gundy admits to an in-season reliance on sleeping pills, yet rarely sleeps for more than five hours. If not for sleeping pills, he says, "my mind would just spin all night."

The 2007 season was expected to be big for Oklahoma State, but it started badly (a 35-14 loss at Georgia) and became defined by a series of crises:

There was the monumental quarterback switch, with Zac Robinson supplanting Reid as the starter. It was an excruciatingly difficult decision for Gundy. Reid was the most heavily recruited quarterback recruit in OSU history.

There was an embarrassing defeat at Troy — 41-23 on national television.

A week later, there was the infamous Gundy press-conference rant. The national fallout was constant for two weeks. It was the most sustained publicity for the OSU football program since 1988, when Barry Sanders won the Heisman Trophy.

In the fourth quarter of their game with Texas, the Cowboys had a 21-point lead. During the final 11:40, the Longhorns scored 24 unanswered points and prevailed 38-35.

A few days later, Gundy dismissed linebacker Chris Collins from the program. In Texas, Collins had pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual assault of a 12-year-old girl. The incident occurred when Collins was in high school — long before he arrived in Stillwater — but Gundy took heat for having had Collins on the roster (and in the starting lineup).

By the end of the 2007 regular season, Gundy admittedly was saturated with stress, but he says he never reconsidered whether he wanted the never-ending responsibility of being a head coach.

"It's never gotten like that," he said. "I think there will come a time, and I don't know when it will be, when I say, 'I'm done with this.' I will have had enough of it. I may just go coach quarterbacks or something. This job is like a dog chasing his tail. You're never finished.

"I've made some good decisions in this program for four years, and I've made some decisions that I would have done differently. But when I made those decisions, I thought it was the right decision to make. When I go to bed at night, I'm good."

Bill Haisten 581-8397
bill.haisten@tulsaworld.com By BILL HAISTEN World Sports Writer

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