Oklahoma State Still Impacting College Football Playoff Race in 2025
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Oklahoma State has been awful all season, but it has still played a small role in the national championship picture.
Throughout the 2025 campaign, the Cowboys have established themselves as one of the worst teams in the entire country. With an opening night win against FCS squad UT Martin being the only victory for the Pokes all year, a 1-11 finish is creeping up on OSU.
With a midseason firing of Mike Gundy making things even worse for the Pokes’ season, the Cowboys effectively punted on the year after just three games. Despite all of the things that have made this season seem meaningless, the Cowboys have still had an impact on the national landscape, even if it's for the wrong reasons.
Perhaps the biggest impact OSU has had on the national title picture comes from its two matchups against College Football Playoff contenders. In what was supposed to be a premier nonconference matchup against Oregon, OSU was clearly outmatched coming into the Week 2 battle.
Entering as a four-touchdown underdog, the Cowboys were down 14-0 just a couple of minutes into the game, proving that they might be even worse than expected. However, the opposite was true as well.
Oregon came in as a top 10 team but wasn’t expected to be the same juggernaut it had been in the 2024 regular season. So, a 69-3 win over the Pokes that featured true dominance from the first couple of minutes made it apparent that the Ducks might be a national title contender again.
Over the next several weeks, OSU’s slate featured losses to Tulsa and some Big 12 hopefuls like Cincinnati and Houston. However, the next big impact the Pokes made in the national picture was against Texas Tech.
The Red Raiders, coming off their first loss of the season, hosted the Cowboys as a nearly 40-point favorite. While OSU played somewhat well throughout the game defensively, a 42-0 loss in Lubbock, where Texas Tech used its third-string quarterback for a large chunk of the game, only helped the Red Raiders’ case in the national landscape.
Over the final few weeks of the season, it could be easy to see those two games come up as evidence of dominance from those teams as they make their cases for the College Football Playoff. While OSU won’t be facing any other playoff hopefuls this season, it has already made its mark on the race.
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.