Oklahoma and Texas are in the Big 12 for now, even though they will move to the SEC in the future, but one head coach seems to think the two schools should no longer be involved in conference affairs.
Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy said he thinks Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark should not allow the Longhorns and Sooners in the conference’s business meetings.
“It’s interesting,” Gundy said, via ESPN’s Dave Wilson. “We go to conference meetings, and OU and Texas are in there. They’re still in the conference. But I’m guessing when they leave, they’re scratching down things that can help them when they're in the SEC. So it is an unusual situation. I think there’s a business side of it that nowadays people say, ‘It is what it is.’ Which 10 years ago, they might not even let them in meetings. The new commissioner, I mean, honestly, if I was him, I wouldn’t let OU and Texas in any meetings.”
Yormark was named the new Big 12 commissioner last month, and he is taking over at a time of instability throughout the college football landscape. Keeping Oklahoma and Texas out of business talks would be an assertive way to start his tenure.
However, Gundy claims he wasn’t being too serious with his remarks.
“I say that jokingly,” he said. “But I mean, if you’re strategically in a business meeting, if it’s two cellphone companies, I don’t want somebody from their company in my company.”
Gundy hasn’t been the biggest fan of conference realignment, starting with an Oklahoma move that would likely end the Bedlam rivalry between the two schools.
“I’m a traditionalist and I didn’t like any of it,” he said in November. “I didn’t like when the Big 12 broke up whenever that was and Missouri and Nebraska headed out. And then, I didn’t like any of it. I liked it the way it was.”
