..Is getting destroyed. In all fairness to Sanders, he has zero time to do anything.

Need to bring in an outside DC and OC

Dunn sucks too as an OC.
We need two new coordinators. Doubt Gundy has the balls.

Is Marcus Freeman making his ND coaching debut today?

Gotta love it!. We play so much better when we're not favored in big games!

Both playoff games were one-sided and boring. I credit coaches for preparing Alabama and Georgia, but I have to believe that OSU, ND, Baylor, or tOSU would have given us more entertaining football. I hope the Fiesta Bowl is the best game of the bowl season.

'He never quits': How Jaylen Warren became a crucial piece of the Oklahoma State's offense​

Scott Wright
Oklahoman

GLENDALE, Ariz. — Oklahoma State running back Jaylen Warren trotted around the field at Saguaro High School, wearing the No. 0 jersey of teammate LD Brown.

Players had swapped jerseys for Thursday’s practice, one of the final workouts of the season as the ninth-ranked Cowboys prepare for the Fiesta Bowl matchup with No. 5 Notre Dame at noon Saturday at State Farm Stadium.

The tighter-than-usual jersey seemed to be the only thing hampering Warren, who says he’s fully healthy for the Fiesta Bowl — a critically important factor for the Oklahoma State offense, which struggled to run the ball without Warren in the Big 12 championship game.

But without the 5-foot-8, 215-pound Warren, the team was missing more than his rushing ability. His toughness, his work ethic, his hard running — all the things that encapsulate Warren — bring a certain spark to the team, an energy that his never-stop-working attitude presents.

“He was our go-to guy all year long,” OSU offensive coordinator Kasey Dunn said. “The kid is a great player and he's a spark plug for our offense. And the kids love him and they rally around him. It's a difference-maker for us.”

A fifth-year senior, Warren has rushed for 1,134 yards and 11 touchdowns on 237 carries. And all that came with only 10 games as the primary running back.

The Cowboys were using a committee of running backs through the first two games, and Warren missed the Big 12 title game with an ankle injury. In between, he was a force. But it wasn’t only what he did on Saturdays that endeared him to his teammates.

“Sunday workouts for us, after the fourth or fifth game, became optional, lifting and running,” offensive lineman Josh Sills said. “I don't think he missed one there towards the end until he got beat up. I think a lot of guys really took attention to that. Just his willingness. He never quits.”

Warren was showing up to those workouts on days after he’d had 30-plus carries, but he never saw that as a reason to take a day off.

“I didn't really earn anything to take off of the workout, so I go,” he said.

Warren came in last January as a transfer from Utah State. At the time of his signing, it appeared Brown — who had just finished his fifth-year senior season — was leaving, but he later reversed course and stayed for a sixth year granted by the NCAA because of the COVID-19 pandemic last year.

“Before I got here, it was obviously long talks with my family deciding on if I wanted to come here,” Warren said. “It was between this school and a couple of other schools. But the running back situation here, which I knew LD was leaving. I was like this probably might be the best fit for me.


“So when I came, LD stayed and it made me — it didn't really make me discouraged, but I was like, OK , that's fine. It is what it is. I just put my head down and worked. So I'm grateful for how things played out.”

When Warren first arrived, he was quiet — and he still is. It’s his nature. But his actions on the field and in workouts soon began to catch the eyes of his teammates.

“He holds himself to a higher standard which, in turn, people around him have held themselves to a higher standard — or held themselves to an equivalent standard that he's held himself to,” Sills said. “I think it's really helped all of us grow, and it's just brought a new mindset into the team on the offensive side.”

Sills and receiver Tay Martin, who both transferred to OSU as well, understand the challenges of coming into a program later in your career, and they’ve been impressed with how Warren handled the transition.

“He made a great transfer coming in, because you can imagine coming in, in a short period of time, trying to get the plays and get along with everybody, get to know a few guys,” Martin said. “He definitely did a great job coming in and just keeping his head down and working. Overall, doing what he had to do, not being a distraction, not trying to do too much.

“Just being himself and just trying to play as hard as he can. So having a guy like that, it's beneficial for the whole team and it showed this year. So I was very grateful to play with him.”

Warren credits his family and his upbringing for his work ethic, understanding that he has a small window in which he gets to play football, and it could close at any time.

“Everything I do kind of revolves around them,” Warren said of his family. “Growing up, I've always wanted — especially my parents being divorced — I want to make them happy in a way. So I guess I just try to do my part in what can make them happy. Football don't make them happy. Me being happy makes them happy, and they know I love football. For us to see success with football, it brings joy.”

And Warren’s father often reminds him to appreciate what he has accomplished in his final season of college football.

“I guess sometimes people see my success bigger, especially this season, bigger than how I see it,” Warren said. “So when people bring that up to me, I'm like, yeah, it's actually pretty cool, me coming in and doing that. Nobody really expected that.

“It's a pretty cool thing to think about.”

My resolution is to post more creative ways to incorporate Faker Bayfield being tackled by the Fayetteville PD.

@glflyer will try and make 3 posts in 2022 that aren't dumb as shit
@osuhoops316 will try and make 2 decent posts which will be double what he did in 2021

Feel free to add your resolutions everyone.

There seems to always be a lot of famous passings just before the end of the year. Usually a famous sports figure, a famous music figure, a famous tv/movie star figure, and/or a famous political figure. John Madden dying today was just another example. Desmond Tutu died over the weekend. Mike Nesmith of the Monkees died last weekend. Just crazy how many happen in the last two weeks of the year. Like God and Satan are cleaning house.

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That was a great game 😂😂😂

Tramel: Notre Dame is golden opportunity for Oklahoma State football in the Fiesta Bowl​

Berry Tramel
Oklahoman

GLENDALE, Ariz. — The gold helmets first appeared in the 1950s. A tribute to Notre Dame’s Main Building, which most know as the Golden Dome.

Notre Dame is all about tradition, football or otherwise. And nothing is more traditional than Notre Dame gold.

Oh, the Fighting Irish have messed with the tradition. In 1958, Notre Dame put jersey numbers on the side of the helmets. Shamrocks(!) were on the helmets from 1959-62. Ara Parseghian, for a time, passed out helmet stickers for good plays, ala Ohio State.

Coach Brian Kelly and athletic director Jack Swarbrick in 2011 directed a helmet change, to a shinier finish, more like the Golden Dome itself.

And Saturday in the Fiesta Bowl, the Oklahoma State Cowboys share a field with that iconic gold headgear.

“I think there's five helmet logos that stand out to all of us in college football,” Mike Gundy said. He declined to start a wildfire by naming the other four. “I will just say Notre Dame is one of them.”

OSU, with more fashion options than Khloe Kardashian, will counter with one of its new-age looks. The Cowboy uniforms are snazzy, and there’s something to be said for that. But Notre Dame’s are iconic. Just like their football tradition.

Which makes this Fiesta Bowl prime opportunity for OSU football. The Cowboys’ first game against Notre Dame. It comes on a neutral field, between top-10 teams.


“The position historically that Notre Dame has held, the fact that we’ve never had the opportunity to play them before, I think it is just a great opportunity,” said Cowboy athletic director Chad Weiberg. “Kind of what makes bowls what they are and makes them exciting, providing those types of opportunities.”

Exactly. Sometimes we forget the power of bowls. In this age of bowl glut (Middle Tennessee-Toledo!) and player opt-outs and coaches jumping jobs and all the focus on the playoff, the bowls at their best provide this kind of matchup.


OSU-Notre Dame. Utah-Ohio State in the Rose Bowl, which follows the Fiesta on ESPN. A chance for an up-and-comer to crash through the class ceiling and play an out-of-conference blueblood on equal footing.

The Cowboys have played at Michigan and Florida and Ohio State. But none of those opponents have been to Stillwater. OSU played Florida State on a neutral field. The Cowboys played Alabama and Miami in bowl games, but in years when both teams were down.

So this Fiesta Bowl is a rare confluence of a great brand, great team opponent.

OSU’s increased status, with its success under Gundy, has reaped upcoming home-and-home series with Alabama and Oregon. And former athletic director Mike Holder tried to schedule Notre Dame, but the Irish are a tough catch.

“Notre Dame, they’re kind of a different deal all together, just because of the way they do scheduling,” Weiberg said. “They move their brand all around the country. Seems like, likely, if we were to play them in a game, it would probably be a neutral site somewhere.”

So those golden helmets aren’t likely to be seen in Stillwater anytime soon.

But good news. Weiberg said getting teams to agree to play in Boone Pickens Stadium isn’t as challenging as it once was. The main scheduling problem these days is not desire, but logistics. Getting the puzzle pieces to fit. Same years open. Same weeks open.

“I think that’s a testament to Coach Gundy and what he’s done with the program, under his leadership, elevating it to where we can schedule those types of games,” Weiberg said. “Some of the top programs in all the different conferences have agreed to play us.”

For more than a century, college football programs have been grouped in unofficial tiers. OSU, to its everlasting credit, has climbed the ladder through several of those classes. But Notre Dame is at the top.

“It's like a 40-year waiting list to play these games, and we get to play them,” said OSU defensive end Brock Martin. “Notre Dame is a big name. It's a household name. They have their own TV deals and all that stuff. So it's a huge opportunity for us.

“We have done a good job of putting ourselves in the spotlight this year. And Gundy has done a good job in his tenure. So I think we are all looking forward to Saturday.”

This opportunity is twofold. Not just to share State Farm Stadium with Notre Dame, but the chance to beat the Fighting Irish when they are at the top of their game. Notre Dame, 11-1 and ranked fifth, staged a renaissance in the last decade under Kelly.

Kelly a month ago fled to Louisiana State, but Notre Dame quickly promoted defensive coordinator Marcus Freeman to head coach, and Notre Dame’s vast fan base is fired up. The same exuberance that Sooners have over new coach Brent Venables? That’s how the Fighting Irish faithful feel about Freeman.

Launching the Freeman era is a big deal in South Bend. Spoiling Freeman’s Notre Dame debut would be even more bounty for OSU.

The Cowboys no longer are a sleepy program, under OU’s shadow and down the ranks of the Big Eight or Big 12.

“Oklahoma State's logo now is marketable and popular from coast-to-coast,” Gundy said. “We've had tremendous success for a long time here and we have been fortunate enough to play and go toe-to-toe with top-five, top-10 teams for a number of years now.

“So, we have a marketable logo. I have all the respect in the world for Notre Dame's helmet. I'm good with all that. But I think people respect Oklahoma State's logo and, our players, they want people to respect that. That's why I was really excited about playing this game.”

Heck, even OSU quarterback Spencer Sanders is excited. Sanders doesn’t claim to be a college football historian. He told us a few weeks ago that he hadn’t even seen “Rudy,” the 1993 film that pays homage to Notre Dame’s tradition.

Sanders says he grew up playing outside, not watching football. But Sanders knows Notre Dame.

“It will be one for the books,” Sanders said. “It's Notre Dame. There's just a lot of excitement. That's what you hear across the whole U.S. It's not just a small-town college that people don't know about. When you say Notre Dame, everybody knows Notre Dame.”

And after Saturday, everybody will know Oklahoma State a little bit more, thanks to those opposing helmets in a Fiesta Bowl that is a golden opportunity.

Go Pokes beat ND

What is Chad Wieberg’s solution to the state of basketball at Oklahoma State? We are seriously looking at last place finishes in both mens and womens basketball. This may have been acceptable under Holder’s watch , but this is supposed to be a new era.

Great stuff as always from our creative team.

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I am really tempted to take Cincy +13.5

anybody else got anything crazy to report?

The Michigan OC won the Broyles award right???!!! Wow

Tramel's ScissorTales: Fiesta Bowl travelblog includes trip to OSU football's team hotel, the Plaza​

Berry Tramel
Oklahoman

The Scottsdale Plaza Resort consists of 404 rooms and suites, and virtually all of them are adorned in orange this week. The Plaza is OSU’s headquarters hotel, and the entire 40-acre campus has been handed over to the Cowboys.

Football team. Administration. Support personnel. Families. Boosters. Fans.

I went over to the Plaza on Thursday to interview athletic director Chad Weiberg, and the Plaza is all things OSU. Meeting rooms, event spaces converted to dining halls for the squad, even desk clerks wearing OSU shirts.

The Plaza is not as nice as the Camelback Inn – such a place has not been invented – but is more conducive to hosting a football team in town for a big game, the Fiesta Bowl against Notre Dame. The Camelback is all spread out. The Plaza is more condensed.

The Friday ScissorTales check in on OSU assistant coach Charlie Dickey's love affair with the Fiesta Bowl and Notre Dame's propensity to use two quarterbacks. But we start with the Cowboys' team hotel.

The Plaza still is very nice. Five swimming pools. A full-service salon and day spa. Fragrant gardens filled with desert flowers. Elegant Spanish Mission-inspired architecture. Stunning views of Camelback Mountain and Mummy Mountain.

The Plaza has plenty of outdoor space, and Mike Gundy pointed out earlier this week that his squad has made use of tennis courts for some outdoor meetings, as a Covid precaution.



The first phase of the Plaza was built in 1976, with the final portion completed in the 1980s. It long has been a Fiesta Bowl team hotel.

I made myself useful at the Plaza. Trish the Dish had dropped me off to chat with Weiberg; she went down Scottsdale Road to a shop she had spotted.

As Weiberg and I chatted outside the Plaza following the interview, the OSU buses took off, heading for practice. A couple of minutes later, Richetti Jones, the Cowboys’ director of player development, came bursting through the doors and said, “Where are the buses?”

Turns out, OSU moved up practice a few minutes and thus left a few minutes earlier.

Jones was a defensive end on OSU’s great 2011 team. He spent 2012 as a video analyst for The Oklahoman, and he was great. Jones returned to OSU a year or so ago to join the football operations staff.

Weiberg pointed out that a couple of staff members, including defensive line coach Joe Bob Clements, had been jogging the 2½ miles to Saguaro High School, where the Cowboys are practicing this week.

That didn’t sound like such a great idea to me, and that didn’t sound like such a great idea to the gregarious Jones. So I told him we’d be glad to give him a ride.

The Dish was going to take me back to the Camelback and catch a shuttle to OSU’s practice, but she instead could take Jones and I to Saguaro High School. He said sure.

Jones always was a delight to cover. Funny, insightful, pleasant. And he was the same on the 10-minute drive. Completely charming, the Dish thought.

He told us that his job consists of being a big brother and mentor to OSU players. Guide them, advise them, counsel them. “I get paid to be myself,” Jones said.

When we got to practice, the Cowboys had yet to take the field. I chatted with a variety of OSU personnel – old friend Chris Thurmond, who was on John Blake’s OU staff a quarter century ago and now is a Cowboy analyst; photographer Bruce Waterfield, who supplies us with many an OSU photo; Sean Maguire, the PR man for Cowboy football.Soon enough, a Fiesta Bowl representative reported that the media shuttle had arrived – we were allowed to view the first 15 minutes of practice – and asked what to do with the press corps. Another Fiesta Bowl rep said to sequester the media in a room in the high school.

The whole thing puzzled me, but sure enough, they took the 30 or so reporters into the Saguaro band room.

Nobody said a word to me, so I just stayed there chatting. But it was quite strange. The Cowboys were just warming up, not even collectively. Why did the media have to be hemmed in, out of sight, until the official start of practice?

It seemed more of a Fiesta Bowl issue than an OSU issue, but heck, who knows?

Soon enough, my colleagues joined me, we watched about 13 minutes of stretching and some spirited semi-scrimmaging by the third string, and then we were ushered out.

I’m no fan of football practice. It’s mostly a waste of my time, unless I get to talk to people. It’s good for photographers and videographers. And some beat writers can pick up some tips that help their reporting. But it’s clear that no one wants us there. I’d prefer to just be banned all together, then we could just spy if we really wanted to. Which we don’t.

After the shuttle dropped us off back at the Camelback, I bunkered down in my room and worked.

We had no formal interviews Thursday, since the governing College Football Playoff canceled all live interviews and thus Fiesta Bowl Media Day. That’s a bummer, but I understand.

The Dish was out shopping, and I cranked out a ScissorTales and my column on Spencer Sanders.

The Fiesta Bowl hosted a media party Thursday night, but I rarely go to those things. I usually have a better offer and I certainly did in the desert. For dinner, we met Carl and Susie Baerst at Tarbell’s, an upscale place in Scottsdale. The Baersts are OU graduates. Carl is an engineering graduate; the Dish spent 30 years as an OU engineering fundraiser and we got to know them through a variety of functions. They live in Phoenix, just a couple of miles from the Camelback.

Charlie Dickey loves the Fiesta Bowl​

Lots of people say they love bowl games. But OSU offensive line coach Charlie Dickey loves a particular bowl game. The Fiesta Bowl.

Dickey grew up with the Fiesta Bowl. He’s a Scottsdale native, and his family has been Fiesta Bowl ticket-holders since the game was born 50 years ago.

Dickey was at the first Fiesta Bowl, matching Arizona State and Florida State. Dickey was at the 1975 Fiesta, and when ASU’s Danny Kush kicked a late field goal to give the Sun Devils a 17-14 upset of Nebraska, Dickey was on the field, having snuck down. Dickey was at the 1986 national-championship game between Miami and Penn State, though he had been at the Rose Bowl the day before, watching his sister cheer for the Sun Devils.

"I have a lot of satisfaction in seeing the Fiesta Bowl become what it's become,” Dickey told fiestabowl.org. “It's a community bowl. No one knew what it was at first and now it's one of the big bowls and has been in the rotation for the national championship. Who would've thought that was going to happen way back in the early 1970s?”

Dickey’s grandfather, also named Charlie Dickey, bought eight Fiesta Bowl tickets when the game was born. For that 1971 game, Dickey’s grandfather rented a bus for his friends and family, ordered fried chicken and other delicacies, and tailgated before and after the game.

“He was very flamboyant and he enjoyed the tickets to the big new game because he could deliver for his friends,” said Bette Dickey, the mother of OSU’s Charlie. “He loved being with his family and friends, and I think that in his heart, he bought the tickets to be able to spend time with his grandson at the game.”

Father, son (Bud) and grandson turned the Fiesta Bowl into an annual rite.

“I loved it, the whole atmosphere,” OSU’s Dickey said. “What is better than watching football in the stadium on Christmas Day sitting in the stands with my dad and my grandfather?”

Dickey’s Fiesta Bowl ties go even deeper. He played football at Arizona and eventually became his alma mater’s offensive line coach. The 1993 Wildcats played Miami in the Fiesta Bowl, with Dickey on the staff.

“It was an awesome experience,” Dickey told fiestabowl.org. “There was a lot of emotions. Walking on that field, I remember being in the middle, standing on that logo and I looked up at the seats where I used to sit and soaked it all in."

Dickey’s mother said she and Dickey’s father had tears in their eyes. Dickey’s grandfather died in 2000, but Bud and Bette Dickey continue on with the Fiesta tickets.

Their son returned again with Kansas State’s 2012, and now he’s back with the 2021 Cowboys.


And here’s a kicker. The Cowboys are practicing at Dickey’s high school alma mater, Saguaro.

Mike Gundy’s youngest son, 17-year-old Gage, was headed from the Scottsdale Plaza to Saguaro the other day to lift weights while the Cowboys practiced.

But Mike Gundy decided to have some fun and bust his offensive line coach.

“I gave him a hard time, because we knew that this was his home and he played here, very tradition-rich high school,” Gundy said. “We were walking out to get ready to get on the bus. And I said, ‘hey, Coach Dickey, do you know how to spell the high school that we're practicing at today? I just need to know if you know how to spell it so he (Gage) can put it in his GPS.’

“And he spit it out real fast on how to spell it. He said, ‘Coach, that's my high school.’”

And this is Dickey’s bowl game.

​

Nice track. If you are in Phoenix for the game and can get on the course I would highly recommend it. Very unique design.

Great job securing our borders by the imbecile in the White House. At this point is there anyone left in the countries these people are fleeing?

Wanted to share what we experienced tonight and see if I am out of line. My wife and I have had season basketball tickets (and football) for 37 years. We have always parked in the Bennet Hall parking lot. When we were working we could do that with our faculty parking permit. When we retired my wife was able to get a free parking permit since she had worked and purchased parking permits for at least 20 years. I also got an OSU paycheck and bought permits for 21 years but two of those years I was on a graduate assistantship and not full time so I could not get the retiree permit.
We usually drive my wife’s car to the games but we could not tonight. When we got back to my car we had a parking ticket on the car. Not a warning- a $40 ticket!!
Since the students are mostly not here because all classes are now online there were plenty of parking spaces in the Bennet Hall lot.
I have recently had another experience with the lack of athletic department support of long term supporters. They only seem to care about big donors and have no consideration for those of us that have supported them for decades.
Am I out of line to be upset?

I have come back and made this board great again. For I have resurrected the one and only gift I could possibly give @soonerinlOUisiana for the new year....

@ClintonDavidScott

Toon this guy needs education and I hope you take it on personally to change this man. Bring happiness back into that cold heart like the Who's did on Christmas with the Grinch.

@limpdickLarry I return the keys back to you sir.

Now I am off to make the non-sports board great again.

One edit** @Sunburnt Indian first change that awful avatar dear friend. Second see if Clinton will take your test. If he passes let me know please.

I know it’s game day but for those in the know how have some of our freshmen looked in these extra bowl practices? I know that freshmen get a lot of practice time for these bowl games. Any word on guys like Kendal Daniels, Aden Kelly, and Mason Cobb.