Five Numbers to Know for Oklahoma State Football Against Tulsa in Week 1
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The Oklahoma State Cowboys get their first shot at a win on Saturday when they travel to Tulsa to face the Golden Hurricane.
It’s a contest filled with so much new for both teams, but especially the Cowboys, who have a new head coach, a new staff and nearly a brand-new roster.
For the last nine months, the Cowboys have been waiting for this moment — a chance to reboot after two awful seasons that led to the firing of Mike Gundy and the hiring of Eric Morris.
As Oklahoma State gets ready for the game, here are five numbers to keep in mind, including new players, new coaches and current streaks.
The Newcomers
The number here is 91. That’s the number of newcomers on the roster, which may be the most in college football history, per OSU’s game notes. It certainly is the most since the transfer portal era began and exceeds the 87 new players that Colorado took in before the 2023 season, which was head coach Deion Sanders’ first season.
OSU broke down the 115-player roster like this:
Transfers: 66
Returning Players: 24
Returning Letterwinners: 13
Players with at least four career OSU starts: 4
Players who played a game at OSU before 2026: 18
OSU also calculated the roster has 45,088 total snaps of Division I experience.
The Season-Opening Streak
The number here is 11. The Cowboys enter the game with a streak of 11 straight season-opening wins, even with only four wins in the last two seasons. It’s the fifth-longest streak in college football right now.
Ohio State 26 (since 2000)
Air Force 19 (since 2007)
Georgia 12 (since 2014)
Oklahoma State 11 (since 2015)
UCF 11 (since 2016)
UCF extended its streak on Thursday with a commanding win over Bethune-Cookman. The Knights visit the Cowboys on Oct. 11.
The Cowboys have won 17 of their 18 season openers since 2008.
Not Ranked (Yet)
The number here is 15. The Cowboys enter the season unranked. They also entered last season unranked. But before the 2024 season, Oklahoma State had been ranked at some point in every season since 2008.
If the Cowboys end up ranked at No. 15 at some point this season it will be the 16th time in the last 19 seasons they’ve spent at least one week at No. 15 or better in the AP Top 25. The Cowboys have also been in the Top 10 in 11 of the last 18 seasons.
Right now, the Cowboys have received votes in both the USA Today preseason Coaches poll and the AP preseason Top 25. The votes were enough to put them among the Top 40 teams in the country, even though they are coming off a 1-11 season.
Morris Ends Long Drought
The number here is 1969. When the Cowboys hired Morris in December, they did something they had not done since 1969 — they hired a sitting head coach. It was also the first time in school history that OSU hired a sitting head coach from an FBS program.
In 1969, the Cowboys hired Floyd Gass, who was the head coach at Austin College in Sherman, Texas, which at the time was an NAIA school. Since then:
Dave Smith (1972): Winnipeg Blue Bombers offensive coordinator.
Jim Stanley (1973-78): Oklahoma State defensive coordinator.
Jimmy Johnson (1979-83): Pittsburgh defensive coordinator.
Pat Jones (1984-94): Oklahoma State assistant coach.
Bob Simmons (1995-2000): Colorado defensive line coach.
Les Miles (2001-04): Dallas Cowboys tight ends coach.
Mike Gundy (2005-25): Oklahoma State offensive coordinator.
Drew Mestemaker’s Yardage Streak
The number here is 15. That’s the number of straight games in which new Oklahoma State Cowboys quarterback Drew Mestemaker has thrown for at least 200 yards in a game. While he tossed an FBS-high 4,379 yards last season, the streak goes back to the end of the 2024 season with North Texas.
Mestemaker started for the Mean Green in the 2024 First Responder Bowl in Dallas and went off for 393 yards and two touchdowns, along with two interceptions. The 15-game streak is the longest active streak in FBS entering the game.
He’s also thrown for at least 250 yards in each of the last five games.
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Matthew Postins is the publisher of Oklahoma State on SI. He is an award-winning sports journalist who was formerly the editor of the College Football America Yearbook and covers the Big 12 Conference for Heartland College Sports.
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