Oklahoma State on Verge of Going Winless in Big 12 Road Games
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Oklahoma State has one final chance to get a win away from home in Big 12 play.
OSU has had one of the most interesting 12 months in all of college basketball. After going 12-20 last season, the Cowboys fired Mike Boynton and eventually hired Steve Lutz after reportedly striking out on Bill Self.
In his first season, Lutz has been a solid coach for the Cowboys and appears to have the program moving in the right direction. Despite having limited time and resources to rebuild the roster in the portal in the 2024 offseason, Lutz has led the Cowboys to a better season than they had in 2023-24.
While OSU is still on pace to finish with back-to-back losing seasons for the first time in decades, the program seems to have emerged from last season’s rock bottom. However, even last season’s team managed to get a Big 12 road win, beating Cincinnati late in the season.
While OSU has more total road wins by winning its two nonconference road games against Seton Hall and Tulsa, it has only one more opportunity to win a Big 12 road game. That opportunity will come on Wednesday when OSU heads to Orlando for its first ever game at UCF.
The Cowboys have a 6-3 record in conference home games, including a win against UCF, which should give OSU some confidence going into this matchup. However, they have yet to win a conference road game and are losing those matchups by an average of 16.2 points.
Simply staying competitive against a UCF team it scored 104 points on last month is a must, but the expectation should be for OSU to get a win. With an 8-12 record in Big 12 play still on the table, the Cowboys need to seize this opportunity to final get a Big 12 road win and potentially set themselves up for a decent conference tournament run.
While winning or losing this game has no significant impact on the season, with the Cowboys firmly out of the NCAA Tournament discussion, finishing the season strong could give the program much-needed momentum ahead of its first full offseason with Lutz in charge.
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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.