Deion Sanders Stunned by Mike Gundy’s Firing at Oklahoma State

Deion Sanders is coaching just his six seasons in the college ranks. Former Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy was in his 21st season at Oklahoma State when he was fired on Tuesday.

Sanders has already seen colleagues come and go in his ranks, both during his time at Jackson State and now at Colorado. But watching Gundy shown the door was a little too much for him when he was asked about the topic curing his coaching show on Tuesday.

 “You do that to Mike Gundy, man?” Sanders said in comments conveyed by USA Today. “To Mike Gundy?”

Sanders went on to call Gundy the “Grand Poobah” of the Big 12. He would be right.

Oklahoma State fired Gundy on Tuesday. The former OSU quarterback and assistant coach left as the program’s winningest coach of all time, passing his mentor as a player, Pat Jones. He was 170-90 and had taken the Cowboys to 18 straight bowl games before that streak was snapped last season. He also led Oklahoma State to the 2011 Big 12 Conference championship and the Big 12 title games in 2021 and 2023.

But the past two seasons cost Gundy his job. The Cowboys went 3-9 last year and winless in Big 12 play for the first time. He turned over several coaches and took a pay cut in the offseason. But this year’s start included a 69-3 loss to Oregon and then a 19-12 loss to Tulsa at home last weekend. Going into this weekend’s game against BYU, Doug Meachem is the interim coach.

Sanders intimated that the job isn’t just about coaching anymore. He would be right, especially in the era of NIL and the transfer portal.

“You can’t expect the man to win out like he’s been winning when the game has changed and it takes finances now to win,” Sanders said. “It just don’t take good coaching now. It takes good coaching and finances.”

Cowboys athletic director Chad Weiberg will be leading the search for a successor to Gundy. This will be the program’s first search for a new head coach since OSU hired Les Miles before the 2001 season.