.vresize.36.36.medium.0.png){kind=small}
.vresize.36.36.medium.0.png){kind=small}
Mike Gundy recalls feeling 'underappreciated' at Oklahoma State
Oklahoma State football has thrived under head coach Mike Gundy, but some Cowboy fans conveniently forgot that fact when the Cowboys were struggling in 2014.
ESPN notes that Gundy's 84-44 record with the Cowboys since 2005 ranks No. 24 nationally, yet more than a few were calling for his job after Oklahoma State lumped up a five-game losing streak last season.
The man who had led the Cowboys to their first conference title in 35 years, and who was coming off a 10-3 season that included a trip to the Cotton Bowl, was suddenly viewed as a villain to those seeking constant gratification from OSU football.
"There was a time I felt underappreciated," Gundy told ESPN. "When you start to feel sorry for yourself, you think back and think, 'Really? I've done this, I've done that, we've done this.' Then you realize it doesn’t matter anyway."
The problem—if you tag it as such—as Gundy sees it, is that he's elevated the status quo at Oklahoma State to levels previously unseen.
Barring his first year at the helm, Gundy has led the Cowboys to a bowl game in every season, a nine-year streak in which OSU has won six bowl games.
It previously took Oklahoma State's football program 22 years to win that many bowl games.
"The reason that happens is because of what we build up," Gundy says. "There's going to be a time when people are pressing and demand a lot from us."
As he sees it, the only way to avert criticism is to sustain the excellence he's made status quo at Oklahoma State.
"We have created this monster," he says. "Now we have to feed it."
(h/t ESPN)
