One of the mystifying tendencies of bowl season is the persistent urge to use a game as a 'catalyst' or to 'build momentum' for next fall, as if anything from a game in late December really survives the offseason and puts an extra spring in players' steps the following August. An uplifting bowl win might be cited as "motivation" to maximize the intervening eight months. But then, the losers are "motivated" by the loss, too, aren't they? And the wind sprints go on either way.

But preseason rankings are real, and those opinions can be heavily manipulated by a strong (or putrid) bowl effort. For example: Oklahoma State fielded a championship-caliber offense this year that averaged 42 points per game; a defense that improved enough to finish in the top half of the Big 12 in every major category and held Texas and Missouri (both on the road) to regular season lows on the scoreboard; and a final record whose only blemishes came at the hands of three division rivals that, when not splitting games with one another, combined to go 34-0 against everyone else. OSU itself was 9-0 against everyone else, and can earn its first 10-win season since Barry Sanders was racing into the Holiday Bowl record books 20 years ago with a win over Oregon.

The Cowboys also happen to be returning virtually their entire offense in 2009, including their record-setting quarterback, three running backs who combined for nearly 2,700 yards on the ground, a likely All-American wide receiver and an All-Big 12 left tackle who might be the best pro prospect on the team. With that haul back alongside half the defense, unfettered access to Boone Pickens' checkbook and a steady upward trend entering Mike Gundy's fifth season, what does finishing off a 10-3 season tonight mean for 2009, as opposed to settling for 9-4? Everything, according to The Oklahoman's John Rohde, who pegs OSU as a serious preseason favorite to compete with Oklahoma and Texas for the Big 12 South in 2009, a la this year's version of Texas Tech -- if the Cowboys can break the double-digit win column against the Ducks, cementing this team as one of the best in school history.

Realize: Oklahoma State hasn't won a conference championship since sharing the old Big Eight crown in 1976; that came 50 years after its only other title, in the 1926 Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association. Expectations are a rare and precious thing in these parts. If a tenth win makes the difference between looking forward to "Pretty Good Oklahoma State" and "The Best Team Ever at Oklahoma State" next fall, that's a good reason to come out tonight with guns blazing.