College Football's Leading Passer Predicted to Turn Around Disappointing Program

The last bits of movement in college football caused by the 2026 NCAA transfer portal cycle stopped near the end of January.

The 2026 cycle was the most chaotic to date; thousands of college football players decided to leave their previous schools in the weeks after the 2025 regular season ended. Many of the players on the move were looking to play for programs with larger followings in order to increase their national exposure.

One player making the upward jump is former North Texas quarterback Drew Mestemaker, who committed to Oklahoma State. He will have three seasons of eligibility with the Cowboys.

The 6-foot-4, 211-pounder walked on at North Texas in 2024 and sat behind Chandler Morris during the regular season. Morris entered the portal prior to the Mean Green's trip to the First Responder Bowl, paving the way for Mestemaker to make his first career start. He completed 26 of 41 passes for 393 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions while rushing for 55 yards and another touchdown.

Drew Mestemaker during the 2025 AAC Championship game. — North Texas Mean Green quarterback Drew Mestemaker (17) scrambles out of the pocket against the Tulane Green Wave | Stephen Lew-Imagn Images

Mestemaker's lone full season as a starter for the Mean Green was a prolific one. He finished 2025 with an FBS-high 4,379 pass yards, 34 touchdowns and nine interceptions, a run that included a season-high 608 pass yards in a win at Charlotte.

He was named to the All-AAC First Team and received the honor of AAC Offensive Player of the Year for his output. Mestemaker was also the recipient of the Burlsworth Trophy, an award given to the best player in college football who began his career as a walk-on.

North Texas head coach Eric Morris accepted the head coaching vacancy left by Mike Gundy at Oklahoma State, creating a mass migration from Denton to Stillwater. Mestemaker is one of more than a dozen transfers Morris is bringing with him to Oklahoma State for the 2026 season.

What a proven quarterback like Mestemaker can bring to a fairly open league like the Big 12 is an intriguing thought among college football media. J.D. PicKell of On3 listed his top 10 most impactful transfers in the 2026 cycle on his show, "The Hard Count." He listed Mestemaker at No. 8, citing the potential for a major turnaround at Oklahoma State in 2026.

"Oklahoma State, last year, went 1-11. You add in a quarterback who led all of college football in passing last year. I know it was UNT, I get that, but you throw four over 4,000 yards, you have my attention," PicKell said.

"If nothing else, Oklahoma State's going to be a lot more frisky. When you look at the Big 12, it's fair to say it's Texas Tech, behind them it's BYU somewhere, and then it's everybody else."

The Cowboys play a pair of College Football Playoff participants in Oregon and Texas Tech in 2026. Oklahoma State will play four Big 12 teams that missed out on the 2025 postseason in 2026: UCF, West Virginia, Colorado and Kansas.