Oklahoma State Starting Quarterback Breaks Foot in Season Opener
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Oklahoma State’s staarting quarterback will be missing some time.
On Friday, On3’s Brett McMurphy and Pete Nakos reported that OSU quarterback Hauss Hejny has suffered a broken left foot and will undergo surgery. After suffering the injury on Thursday night in OSU’s season opener against UT Martin, Hejny is expected to miss at least five weeks.
If Hejny is able to return immediately following his five-week minimum, that would likely mean his next potential game would come on Oct. 11 when OSU faces Houston in the sixth game of the season. While Hejny has spent most of fall camp in a quarterback battle with Zane Flores, he earned the right to start in the season opener and showed exactly why in the first quarter, making a few dazzling plays with his feet.
After the game, OSU head coach Mike Gundy refused to give any potential injury updates on Hejny but spoke glowingly about both him and Flores. With Hejny on the field in the first quarter, OSU scored two touchdowns, with the Cowboys’ third not coming until the latter stages of the fourth quarter.
In his debut, Hejny finished with 96 yards and a touchdown through the air, completing five of his 10 passes. He also added four carries for 27 yards and a touchdown, finishing the night as OSU’s leading rusher as his 6.8 yards per carry were the most on the team.
How it impacts OSU
In the short-term, this simply means that Flores will take over as the starting quarterback. Considering how tight the quarterback battle appeared to be throughout the preseason, the Cowboys should still be in good hands, as Flores isn’t a traditional “backup” and was set to get on the field against UT Martin before Hejny’s injury.
Although Flores’ throwing ability might even be a bit better than Hejny’s and he is capable of being a mobile quarterback, Hejny’s rushing element will be something that the Pokes miss. Against UT Martin, Hejny had the most yards per carry, but also wasn’t far behind in total rushing yards, with Kalib Hicks finishing as the Pokes’ leading rusher with 21 carries for 56 yards.
With Flores starting under center for the foreseeable future, the job is firmly his to lose. Although Hejny might get a shot again when he returns from injury, a broken foot in the first game of the season is a perfect way to derail his freshman year and potentially the Cowboys’ 2025 season.
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.