Oklahoma State's Steve Lutz Explains Advantage of Fewer Big 12 Games

Oklahoma State’s schedule is set to look a little different next season, which could help the Cowboys in a big way.

On Thursday, the Big 12 released the home and away matchups for each team for next season. The Cowboys are slated for some critical matchups in Stillwater and around the country, but they will only have to play 18 conference matchups next season, with the Big 12 reversing the 20-game slate it tried in the first season with 16 teams.

While there doesn’t seem to be much of an advantage beyond having two fewer conference games to worry about, OSU coach Steve Lutz explained the other potential impacts it has on his team.

“It gives us more scheduling flexibility,” Lutz said. “What I mean by that is different programs are in different spaces. When you come into year two, you can schedule a little more aggressively.”

Last season, the Cowboys were stuck with a conference schedule that had no byes and was a non-stop marathon in one of the toughest conferences in basketball. As for the 2025-26 season, the Big 12 slate will still feature plenty of tough opponents in a consecutive nature, but should be slightly more forgiving and allow for OSU to make the necessary nonconference moves to help achieve the big-picture goals.

“It allows us to [schedule for the NCAA Tournament], but it allows us to pick and choose a little bit better,” Lutz said. “You can pick and choose your MTE that fits you, rather than maybe, say, going to Maui or something like that.”

After explaining how the reduced conference slate allows the Cowboys to schedule with a heightened focus on the NCAA Tournament, Lutz went into more detail about how that works. As he enters his second season in Stillwater, he is in a better position to have things his way in all aspects, including the schedule.

While Mike Boynton’s teams often had to deal with the repercussions of their nonconference blunders, Lutz is hoping a well-thought-out schedule could help OSU avoid the fate of some recent seasons.

“We're scheduling to be in the NCAA Tournament and scheduling to have a good seed,” Lutz said. “In year one, I think that we basically took the schedule that was left over and we added a few here and there to it. Right now, with what we've scheduled, we'll have enough opportunities to schedule ourselves into the NCAA Tournament as an at-large bid.”