Oklahoma State Fans Needed Hope Last Year; Now They Crave Trust

This time last year Oklahoma State fans needed a ray of hope. Anything would have done, really. OSU was coming off a 12-20 season (3-15 in the Big 12), and GIA was so quiet you could have heard Mike Gundy’s mullet bounce off his shoulders had he walked through during a live game.

Poke fans used to thrilling, high-flying, defensively-aware hoops were getting second helpings of Chris Olivier post-ups and Jeff Newberry trying to create off the dribble. I love those guys, but it was not a high-water mark in Oklahoma State hoops history.

The place needed a defibrillation.

And it got one in the form of Brad Underwood. After an 0-6 start to the Big 12, the Big Undie had the place popping like it was 1999 all over again. There were some empty calories in there, though. OSU *only* went 9-9 in conference play and it played that kind of defense that would have made Mr. Iba roll over in his white-maple casket.

But It didn’t matter — and we didn’t care — because the Old Barn was infused with the kind of hope that revitalizes athletic departments and reconfigures career trajectories (just ask Jeffrey Carroll). OSU fans badly needed something to hope in, and OSU athletic director Mike Holder served it up on a silver platter. The perfect hire.

And then it was over.

Oklahoma State fans don’t need hope now. They were already given a reprieve from the 100-year war of the Travis Ford contract. Those too young to remember the Final Four runs were at least given glimpses of a once and future GIA. They understand it now.

To avoid a dead cat bounce, though, what Cowboy fans need now is somebody they can trust. The Iba tree narrative and “these are my people” picture Brad Underwood painted in bright orange watercolors was largely unnecessary. It was a nice bonus to the actual play on the court. It was simply architectural topper to the skyscraper he was forging.

And now, because of all that talk of home and midwestern values, Underwood has temporarily paralyzed a program.

Oklahoma State administrators are scrambling, and more importantly, fans feel betrayed. It would be one thing for a coach to bail for North Carolina or UCLA. We get that. We understand that Oklahoma State is a Tier 2 or Tier 3 program in college hoops. But Illinois? After one year? That’s a Salim Stoudamire-sized dagger.

“This probably stings a lot of people to where they’re like, ‘Man, I was really in last year, and now I don’t can I ever really …’ it’s like when you cheat on a woman,” Doug Gottlieb told us this week.

“When you cheat on a woman, you can go to therapy and you can say, ‘Honey, baby I’ll change,’ but in the back of her mind she’s like, ‘Am I ever going to trust this guy ever again?’ That’s kind of where Oklahoma State fans are right now.”

Yeah it is.

Mike Holder knows he has to regain the trust of fans who were starting to come back in droves. The way he interprets how OSU fans feel right now fascinates me, though. Does he think winning solves everything? This is normally the case across all sports in all eras. Fans will come to games to watch a winning team.

I’m not sure it’s the case this time.

Imagine this scenario: Holder hires [small name X] from [small school X] and that coach wins 22 games in his first year. The collective response from OSU fans is going to be: “Cool, when’s he leaving?”

Sure, some people will attend. But not like they did in 2016-17. I hope Holder doesn’t underestimate how much trust has been broken here. I’m not sure how he could with the KD exit last summer and now this. Oklahomans are not a people receptive of deception.

There are a few ways to get that trust back, though. The first — and most obvious — is by hiring Gottlieb. That’s an automatic, cannot-miss hire in terms of attendance. The people who are out will be all the way in by the time he’s halfway through his introductory press conference. 100 percent buy-in before Day 1 of the Gottlieb era is over.

But that’s not the only way.

The other way is to lure a big name with a lot of cash. If you get, let’s just say, Tom Crean and connect his checking account to Boone Pickens’ routing number, then fans will at least believe he’s in it for the medium-term haul. That’s a significantly better scenario than hiring the Middle Tennessee State coach.

I have no idea what Mike Holder is going to do. I’ve heard variations of everything. Holder himself likely doesn’t know what he’s going to do. It’s going to be difficult to get out of a room with Doug Gottlieb barricading the thing behind him and setting explosives in the hallway in it talking hoops and not at least dream a little bit about what could be.

But if Gottlieb is not the answer, and ultimately I’m betting that Holder doesn’t believe that he is, then the importance of a hire OSU fans can trust is paramount to the future of the OSU men’s basketball program. I hope Holder understands how important his choice has just become.