What Does Texas’ Transition To Tom Herman Mean For Oklahoma State?

Charlie Strong was fired on Saturday one day after he said he had a national championship-type team. Yeah, that was really a thing he said on Friday after getting pounded by TCU at home to end his career as the Texas coach with the three-straight seven-loss seasons (for the first time ever).

Texas coach Charlie Strong said the record doesn't speak to how good they are. Said they're good enough to win a national championship

— Anwar Richardson (@AnwarRichardson) November 26, 2016

So he was fired (Baylor … psssst you need a disciplinarian who can recruit … you should hire him … pssst), and Herman was hired after getting beat by Memphis (!) on Friday. Herman guided Houston to a 22-4 record in two seasons and beat Florida State in the Peach Bowl last year. He also lost to Memphis, SMU, Navy and UConn.

Is he going to be good in Austin? Maybe. Who knows. Strong was incredible at Louisville and stunk at Texas. Les Miles was good not great at Oklahoma State and crushed at LSU. There is no magic formula. Herman has proven he can get dudes to Houston, but Texas’ issue has never really been getting dudes, has it?

I do think Strong probably left the program with a better trajectory than he found it. Maybe he would have been awesome in Year 4. Look at what Colorado’s Mike MacIntyre did after three years of oblivion. But Texas is not the kind of school that has the time to find out. It was time to move on. Especially after losing to Kansas.

The humorous part here is that it looks like the Horns will be bowl eligible (!)

If UCLA loses to Cal, Texas clinches a bowl bid via APR. I think they'll accept, that gets Herman time to look at his new players

— Samuel Chi (@ThePlayoffGuru) November 27, 2016

But back to what this means for Oklahoma State. There are two primary things. Let’s talk about one thing I don’t think it means first. I don’t think it changes much on the recruiting front for Oklahoma State. If anything, it might help. Houston ranked No. 36 nationally in recruiting this year. It is currently No. 35 for next year. OSU was No. 45 last season and is No. 32 for 2017.

The reason it doesn’t matter that much for OSU that a great recruiter like Tom Herman is at Texas is because Texas was already great at recruiting (they finished No. 7 last season). There are only so many guys a team can sign. It might actually help loosen the grip UH had on the Houston area — a former favorite of Gundy and Co. — if a not-as-great recruiter is brought in to replace Herman.

So if Texas and Houston’s combined ranking last year was No. 43 (UH was No. 36 and Texas was No. 7) and Texas moves up to say, No. 3, this year, I bet UH drops significantly to No. 50 or beyond. That’s better for OSU, right?

Anyway, on to the things this hiring does mean.

The first is that Mike Gundy along with Bob Stoops and Gary Patterson remain the stalwarts in a league of turnover. Because TCU hasn’t been in the Big 12 as long as OSU and OU, you can sort of look at Stoops and Gundy as the long-standing residents in a frat house full of multimillionaires.

Per @Pokelahoma, #HC's each school has now had during Gundy's tenure

UT: 3rd
TT: 3
KU: 4?
KSU: 2
BU: 3
OU: 1
ISU: 3
WVU: 2
TCU: 1

Right?

— I'm beyond help (@RobertW_OkSt) November 27, 2016

Gundy has owned them all, too, in recent years. Except for OU. Here is his record against Big 12 teams.

• Kansas: 8-1 (89%)
• Texas Tech: 10-2 (83%)
• TCU: 4-1 (80%)
• Iowa State: 7-2 (78%)
• Missouri: 3-1 (75%)
• Kansas State: 6-3 (67%)
• Colorado: 2-1 (67%)
• Nebraska: 2-1 (67%)
• West Virginia: 3-2 (60%)
• Baylor: 7-5 (58%)
• Texas A&M: 4-3 (57%)
• Texas: 5-7 (42%)
• OU: 2-9 (18%)

The other thing this means, and this is maybe more important, is that coupled with LSU’s hiring of Ed Orgeron on Saturday, there will be no monstrous job available for a long period of time this offseason (barring something crazy happening at Notre Dame). With Gundy’s name popping up every time a top 10 job came up, this will be a nice non-distraction.

Was Gundy ever going to leave for a LSU or Texas? Probably not, but now he can’t because they aren’t actual jobs anymore. Now all we have to worry about is winning Bedlam, getting into a New Year’s Day game and reaping the recruiting benefits heading into the offseason.

The Texas situation with Herman will play itself as the years roll on. Somebody at some point will get them back to at least playing for conference championships (if not winning them). Might be Herman, might be somebody else. But for now, we wait. We wait until next season (and beyond) with Texas. We wait until another monster job opens for Gundy’s name to be floated. We wait until next weekend for Bedlam.

Texas plays catch-up as Oklahoma State plays for a Big 12 title.

It might not be like this forever, but for now it feels pretty dang good.