Gundy tempers turnaround

STILLWATER, Okla. – Earlier this season, as Mike Gundy raised his voice and lashed into his Oklahoma State football squad during a team meeting, a handful of players couldn’t help but snicker.

“We know, coach,” one of them said from the back of the room. “You’re a man! You’re 40!”

Actually, Gundy is 41 now, and he doesn’t seem to mind when the Cowboys poke fun at him for last season’s press conference tirade that earned him a million hits on YouTube, condemnation from journalism and women’s groups and a spoof by Justin Timberlake on the ESPY Awards.

It’s easy for Gundy to laugh about every bit of it now. After all, 13 months later, Gundy is causing the college football world to buzz once again – and this time it’s for a different reason.

“I think people are beginning to see just how good of a coach he really is,” athletic director Mike Holder said.

Love or loathe Gundy, the point is tough to argue.

The Cowboys are 5-0 and ranked No. 17 in the country thanks to an offense that averages 52.6 points per game and a defense that’s markedly improved from a year ago. With All-America candidates such as receiver Dez Bryant and a steady quarterback in Zac Robinson, there’s not a team in the country that the Cowboys – on a good night – couldn’t beat.

That includes second-ranked Missouri, which plays host to Oklahoma State on Saturday at Faurot Field in Columbia. Still, win or lose against the Tigers, Gundy is well on his way to silencing those who said he was in over his head, the ones who would’ve surely called for his dismissal had this season not been a success.

“There’s no question that going through adversity makes you better,” Gundy said. “I’ve got a long way to go as a coach. But I think I’m better for the things that I’ve been through.

“It’s easy for me to close my eyes at night and go to sleep. I’ve been coaching for 20 years, and it hasn’t always been that way.”

It wasn’t easy last season, when Gundy’s coaching was called into question following a non-conference loss at Troy. The next week, after Oklahoma State defeated Texas Tech in Stillwater, Gundy unleashed his now-infamous rant against Daily Oklahoman columnist Jenni Carlson.

Gundy was upset that Carlson suggested quarterback Bobby Reid lost his job to Robinson because Reid was soft. He called the article “garbage” and said it made him “want to vomit.” Then he left the room without fielding questions.

“It still stuns me to this day all of the attention it received across the country,” Gundy said. “But I think the team appreciated it. I think they got a big kick out of it once they realized where I was coming from.”

Holder said he wishes Gundy would’ve handled the situation in a different manner.

“It probably wasn’t the best decision he ever made,” Holder said. “We talked about it. That’s just part of life, making decisions and accepting the consequences. In retrospect, he may not handle it that way again.

“That’s the real question: Given the same situation in the future, how is he going to handle it? Because you know something else is going to come up.”

Holder pointed out that Gundy – Oklahoma State’s all-time passing leader – still is a young coach, learning on the go.

“I really felt like his motives were good,” Holder said. “There are just better ways of handling things like that. But Mike is a competitor. He’s not the type to back down from a challenge.”

Maybe that explains why Gundy, in the midst of criticism, has begun to flourish.

Wealthy Oklahoma State booster T. Boone Pickens made it clear during the offseason that he’d be none too happy with another mediocre season from the Cowboys, who won second-tier bowl games the past two years after finishing the regular season 6-6.

As a result, whether he’ll admit it or not, Gundy entered the 2008 campaign on the hot seat, which probably wasn’t fair. Now in his fourth season in Stillwater, Gundy signed top-30 recruiting classes the past three years. Building a program means redshirting most of those players and giving them time to develop.

Patience, though, never has been a popular word with fans and boosters. And, frankly, it never has been with Gundy, either. Not until now.

“I’ve learned to have patience,” Gundy said. “I’m not a patient person. But I’ve learned to have patience with these guys. They’re going to make mistakes.

“The good thing is that I’ve never lost confidence or second-guessed how we do things. So if people ever doubt our team or our staff – unless I know we haven’t put in the time or effort – it doesn’t really affect me much. I’ve got a good barometer of what’s happening.”

Apparently so.

A prime example was Gundy’s decision to bench Reid last season in favor of Robinson, who ranks third in the country in pass efficiency. Although loads of improvement still can be made, the Cowboys have gone from 101st in total defense in 2007 to 51st this year.

“You can just see how they react to each other and how they take care of each other on and off the field,” Gundy said. “It’s very similar to what a family would be like. I can tell that they care about each other.”

And they care about Gundy, too, which is why players are so quick to come to his defense whenever the subject of last season’s outburst is broached. It’d be a shame, they said, for his reputation to be reduced to a two-minute clip on YouTube.

“We’ve moved on from that,” offensive lineman Brady Bond said. “And so has he.”