Reviving Bedlam Shouldn't Be a Priority for Oklahoma State

The Cowboys are on a Bedlam winning streak, and they have no reason to jeopardize it.

Oklahoma State's Rashod Owens (10) stiff arms Oklahoma's Jasiah Wagoner (23) during a Bedlam college football game between the Oklahoma State University Cowboys (OSU) and the University of Oklahoma Sooners (OU) at Boone Pickens Stadium in Stillwater, Okla., Saturday, Nov. 4, 2023. | SARAH PHIPPS/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK

Bedlam isn’t on the schedule moving forward, and Oklahoma State shouldn’t be worried about changing that.

In 2023, OSU beat Oklahoma in the final scheduled Bedlam matchup in Stillwater. Fans piled onto the field after the Cowboys’ win, celebrating their last opportunity to beat their in-state rival for the foreseeable future. 

Of course, the reason Bedlam ended was because Oklahoma moved to the SEC alongside Texas in 2024. Without any open nonconference slots available for either side, the programs effectively went their separate ways.

That seemed to be the end of those discussions for the most part. Aside from some Mike Gundy thoughts of a Bedlam spring game, the idea of OSU and OU playing anytime soon was out of reach.

While the entire saga seemed to have died down, it sparked up again last week when Tulsa World’s Berry Tramel reported that OU athletic director Joe Castiglione said he reached out to OSU a few months ago but received “minimal interest” from the Cowboys.

While getting Bedlam back on the slate would be fun and good for the state, OSU is right to avoid scheduling the Sooners anytime in the near future. Over the next few seasons, OSU already has some premier nonconference opponents scheduled in Oregon, Alabama, Nebraska and Arkansas. 

Adding the Sooners to that list doesn’t make much sense considering the constantly evolving nature of the college football landscape. With OSU in the midst of a rebuild and now looking for a new coach for the first time in over two decades, facing the Sooners wouldn’t exactly be helpful for the program.

Besides any of the football reasons OSU might not be interested in a Bedlam game, there are also plenty of other reasons for the Cowboys to avoid the Sooners on the gridiron. Oklahoma was the premier matchup for the Cowboys every season and chose to move to the SEC.

The Sooners left the Cowboys, not the other way around. All of the responsibility for the lack of a Bedlam matchup falls on the Sooners, and it shouldn’t be OSU’s responsibility to drop all of its future plans just for the chance to schedule Bedlam.

The rivalry has continued in most other sports simply because of the relative ease of scheduling. When the Sooners left the Big 12, the Cowboys had to plan a future without them and did so, and the rivalry will only resume once it makes sense for the Cowboys to add the Sooners back into those plans.

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