Oklahoma State Needs to Stay Away From Brian Kelly
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Oklahoma State is searching for its next coach, but it shouldn’t consider the latest name in the pool.
On Sunday, LSU made headlines after deciding to fire head coach Brian Kelly. After being with the Tigers since 2022, Kelly’s tenure at LSU came to an abrupt end, with his team’s latest loss against Texas A&M being the last straw.
Throughout his career, Kelly has coached some of the top teams in the country, most notably his 2012 Notre Dame that was unbeaten going into its national title game loss to Alabama. In 2021, OSU would have been set to face Kelly’s Fighting Irish in the Fiesta Bowl, but that offseason he bolted for LSU.
Now, with his LSU tenure behind him, Kelly will be looking for another spot in the college football landscape, but OSU would be wise to keep him as far away from Stillwater as possible. Although there is plenty to be said about his ability as a coach, OSU could face the risk of hiring Kelly leading to a much worse situation than it’s in now.
Of course, Kelly is well known for being a hothead on and off the field. While it isn’t all that uncommon for coaches to get emotional, Kelly’s attitude simply makes him unlikeable to many in the college football world, and it wouldn’t take much for him to rub OSU and its fans the wrong way in a hurry.
After being in situations where the expectation is to compete for national titles, OSU would be a step down, and he might only see the program as a stepping stone to get back to one of the big names in college football. It also wouldn’t make sense for OSU from a financial standpoint, given that Kelly has been relatively unproven in recent years and would demand a large paycheck.
Of course, another reason to avoid Kelly is that the Cowboys are likely already deep in their coaching search and could even be in the closing stages of it. That was the biggest luxury of firing Gundy back in September, giving Chad Weiberg and company basically the entire season to find their next guy.
With 200 wins across over two decades as a head coach, Kelly’s resume is among the most notable in college football, but the risk would simply outweigh the reward for the Cowboys. Ideally, OSU can find someone to come in and grow alongside the program for the next decade and beyond, and Kelly simply doesn’t fit that vision.
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.