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<\/p>\nSTILLWATER, Okla. \u2014 It didn\u2019t take long for Eric Morris to understand just how much work needed to be done at Oklahoma State.<\/p>\n
On Dec. 7, 2025, less than 48 hours after he wrapped up his final game at North Texas, Morris gathered his new team together. The meeting room, which seats roughly 200 people, wasn\u2019t even a quarter full.<\/p>\n
Major college football rosters have more than 100 players, but there weren\u2019t even 50 present when Morris first spoke as the team\u2019s new head coach. Some had already entered the transfer portal, and many more were planning to do so.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember FaceTiming the guys back in Denton immediately after it happened,\u201d said Raj Murti, Morris\u2019 general manager at North Texas and now at Oklahoma State. \u201cThey asked, \u2018How was the first team meeting?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cI said, \u2018Guys, there\u2019s no one here. We need a whole team.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
The next seven weeks were a whirlwind as Morris, Murti and the Oklahoma State staff constructed one of the biggest and swiftest roster overhauls in college football history. When the dust settles in August, the Cowboys will have 87 new players, tying Deion Sanders\u2019 2023 Colorado squad for the most newcomers in the transfer portal era.<\/p>\n
The goal is to turn a team that cratered in the final years of the Mike Gundy era \u2014 going winless in league play each of the last two seasons \u2014 into a legitimate Big 12 championship contender, not just in 2026, but for years to come.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe needed a clean slate,\u201d Morris said.<\/p>\n
Under Gundy, Oklahoma State became a consistent winner. The former Cowboy quarterback took over a program in 2005 that was sub-.500 all-time before his arrival (471-502-48) and transformed it into a modern success story. After going 170-90 in 21 years \u2014 making him the winningest coach in school history by more than 100 victories \u2014 Oklahoma State is on the right side of the all-time win column (641-592-48).<\/p>\n
But cracks in the foundation began to show in recent years, and things quickly unraveled after Oklahoma State won 10 games in 2023 and appeared in the Big 12 Championship Game. The Cowboys went 3-9 in 2024, ending the season with nine consecutive losses. In 2025, their only win came against an FCS school. They lost at Oregon 69-3 in Week 2, and after a 19-12 loss to Tulsa in the next game, Gundy was gone.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n Quarterback Drew Mestemaker and running back Caleb Hawkins are two of the 19 transfers who followed coach Eric Morris from North Texas. (Bryan Terry \/ USA Today Network via Imagn Images)<\/p>\n
The reasons were plentiful, but the program\u2019s failure to adapt to the rapidly evolving roster management space<\/a>, from how they used the transfer portal to what they were willing to spend on NIL, was near the top of the list. Last season, Oklahoma State had what some rival personnel directors deemed the worst roster in Power 4 football.<\/p>\n That\u2019s what made the clean slate Morris referenced so necessary. Before overhauling the roster, Morris did the same with the staff. All the on-field coaches are new. \u201cNo holdovers except one off-the-field guy,\u201d Morris said. \u201cWe needed people that believed in my vision.\u201d<\/p>\n There were several members of the 2025 team that Morris would have liked to retain but couldn\u2019t due to budgetary reasons.\u00a0Signing transfers costs<\/a> significantly more than high school recruits,<\/a> and having to court so many meant Oklahoma State had to be mindful of how and where it spent its money.<\/p>\n \u201cThe bigger (the roster flip), the harder it gets because getting kids from the portal, it\u2019s more expensive than doing it the other way,\u201d Morris said.<\/p>\n But Morris was going to err on the side of newcomers based on his past head coaching experience and discussions with others who have been in similar situations.<\/p>\n \u201cTalking to coaches in the portal era, taking over clubs who weren\u2019t very good, they always wish they had cleaned out more when they were rebuilding something,\u201d Morris said. \u201cThat\u2019s something multiple coaches said to me.\u201d<\/p>\n Among the 87 newcomers, one held the key to the entire rebuild: quarterback Drew Mestemaker.<\/p>\n Mestemaker, who broke onto the scene as a redshirt freshman last year at North Texas, has a unique story. He was never a full-time varsity starting quarterback at Vandegrift High in Austin, Texas. He walked on at North Texas after a recommendation from Jeff Christensen, a longtime private quarterback coach whom Morris knows from his days at Texas Tech with Patrick Mahomes, a Christensen client.<\/p>\n Mestemaker became the starter last season after Chandler Morris transferred to Virginia, and he threw for 4,379 yards (the most in the FBS) and led North Texas to a 12-2 record (the best in school history). His production, frame and arm talent drew plenty of suitors in the portal, but the Cowboys knew if they got him, everything else would fall into place.<\/p>\n \u201cAny player we spoke with, whether they were coming from North Texas or elsewhere, the first question they asked was: Is Drew coming?\u201d Murti said. \u201cPlayers are always going to be your best recruiters.\u201d<\/p>\n Mestemaker had video calls with two schools but committed to Morris on Jan. 3, a day after the portal opened.<\/p>\n \u201cI can\u2019t leave \u2019em,\u201d Mestemaker said. \u201cI gotta see this thing through.\u201d<\/p>\n He didn\u2019t come cheap, though, landing a two-year deal expected to pay him $7.5 million \u2014 $3.5 million in 2026 and $4 million in 2027, according to the Tulsa World<\/a>.<\/p>\n Getting Mestemaker helped Oklahoma State\u2019s efforts in courting two other offensive stars who led the Mean Green to the American Conference Championship Game. Caleb Hawkins,\u00a0the No. 1 running back<\/a> in the transfer portal, led the FBS with 25 rushing touchdowns as a true freshman in 2025, while Wyatt Young finished third nationally with 1,264 receiving yards and had the third-most yards after catch (768).<\/p>\n For Hawkins, it was a bit of a homecoming. He grew up in Oklahoma and played high school ball at North Rock Creek in Shawnee, roughly 60 miles south of Oklahoma State. His position coach at UNT, Patrick Cobbs, also joined the OSU staff.<\/p>\n Young said he tested the market, but knowing Mestemaker and Hawkins were Stillwater-bound, along with so much of the coaching staff, made a difference.<\/p>\n \u201cFinding a place where you\u2019re comfortable, you trust the coaching staff, and they\u2019re gonna use you the way you want to be used, that made it an easy option for me,\u201d Young said. \u201cAt the end of the day, this is where I wanted to be because my guys are here.\u201d<\/p>\n Said Murti: \u201cDrew, Caleb and Wyatt turned down a lot of money to come here.\u201d<\/p>\n As important as Mestemaker, Hawkins and Young were, the process to land the other 84 newcomers was no less frenetic.<\/p>\n Morris\u2019 first week on the job included individual meetings with each of the players who attended his first team meeting. Some were offered new contracts to stay. Others were told the harsh reality of their futures in Stillwater.<\/p>\n \u201cWe told them, \u2018This is what we think of you, this is what we potentially want out of you,\u2019 or \u2018maybe it\u2019s time for you to find somewhere else to play,\u2019\u201d Murti said. \u201cIt was tough. It was hard to do that.<\/p>\n \u201cSome of those guys, I told them, \u2018Hey, if you want to stay here and play football, that\u2019s great, but there won\u2019t be another rev share contract.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t nearly as public as Sanders\u2019 \u201cLouis Vuitton\u201d momen<\/a>t when he took over in 2023 \u2014 which sparked significant reaction \u2014 but the result was much the same. Modern college football roster management isn\u2019t pretty.<\/p>\n Murti, executive director of player personnel Ethan Russo (who spent 2025 at Wisconsin but was at North Texas before that) and director of scouting Wes Drake joined the personnel staff in December. The timing of the new winter transfer portal window \u2014 which had been in December in previous years but was pushed back to January this year \u2014 allowed them time to quickly assemble a board of transfer portal targets.<\/p>\n Murti and Drake had assembled one at North Texas, but for a different caliber of player, given the Mean Green\u2019s standing in the national landscape.<\/p>\n \u201cWe had to completely shred that,\u201d Murti said.<\/p>\n At Oklahoma State, they needed Power 4 players.<\/p>\n Drew Mestemaker belongs in some outrageous convos pic.twitter.com\/HLDvR9vZ5a<\/a><\/p>\n