Oklahoma State Needs Another Season Before Judging Steve Lutz
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Oklahoma State has had an interesting run in Steve Lutz’s first season, but it might be too early to draw conclusions.
After struggling through most of the Big 12 slate and playing mostly uncompetitive games against the conference’s best, OSU finally broke through. On Tuesday, the Cowboys upset No. 9 Iowa State on their home floor to mark their first win over a ranked team this season and their first win over a top 10 team in three seasons.
While it shows the Cowboys’ ceiling and ability to upset the nation’s top teams, one win doesn’t erase their struggles against those squads that have defined the season. Over the past two Saturdays, OSU faced Texas Tech and Kansas and fell flat in both matchups. Losing by a combined 70 points, OSU also set a new Gallagher-Iba Arena record for the largest margin of defeat against the Red Raiders.
The Cowboys’ struggles haven’t necessarily been confined to their matchups against the Big 12’s best teams. While OSU has mostly taken care of business against teams around them in the standings at home, it has yet to win a Big 12 game on the road and struggled regardless of the level of its opponent.
One of the largest storylines of Mike Boynton’s final year as head coach was OSU’s inability to win on the road, going 1-8 in Big 12 road games. With a win at Seton Hall in the nonconference slate, it appeared those issues might not persist into the 2024-25 season.
Of course, it’s difficult to blame those problems on only Lutz, especially considering the situation he was thrust into. After OSU took its time to hire Lutz, he came into Stillwater with many highly coveted transfers already finding their new home and also being too late to get a desirable pitch across to OSU’s outgoing players.
While Lutz was dealt a tough hand in his first year, the Cowboys will have higher expectations for his second season and a pressure to perform will arise. With an opportunity to go through an entire offseason and pitch the players he wants in full, Lutz will be able to be properly judged. As for now, he has given the program some level of optimism and could ride that wave into year two.
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Ivan is a sports media student at Oklahoma State University. He has covered OSU athletics since 2022 and also covers the OKC Thunder for Inside The Thunder and Thunderous Intentions.