Mike Gundy, who owns stock in Axe hair gel

As all coaches do each and every week, select members of the team and coaching staff give press conferences about the upcoming game. With so much riding on the game Saturday for the Pokes, I wanted to take a look at what Cowboys head coach, Mike Gundy had to say.

Mike “I’m a man and I’m 40″ Gundy:

“We took a few days off as a team – coaches and players. We brought the team back on Saturday night and had meetings and practice on Sunday and today is their day off. We’ll be back at it on Tuesday. Everybody’s spirits are high and excited. We had a good practice on Sunday afternoon. We’re excited about the game; I know everybody else is. It’s a great week for the state of Oklahoma and our players will be looking forward to playing in the game Saturday night. I think our challenge now is just to keep everybody kind of calm and under control, coaches included. Everybody is excited about the upcoming game, so that’s kind of our goal from this point forward.”

A member of the media actually asked him which coaches need to stay under control….

 ”Well, me. I’m pretty excited about the game. And all of them. Not anything to be alarmed about, I just think everybody is excited to get back on the field and play. As we all know, it’s been 10 days or so that we played in a game. One thing we’d like to do is coach and play in a game, so they’re just as excited to get back out on the field.”

Another genius question, where does Bedlam rank in the history of the school:

 ”I don’t know. I say this all the time – they’re all big, because if you don’t win enough of them, then the ones at the end don’t matter. For the first time in this program’s history – I’ll go back 50 years, maybe further – they have a chance to win a conference championship. So it’s a big game for that reason. It’s something that’s not ever been accomplished here, and the players are aware of that and the coaches are aware of that. It would be nice for our team to go out and play well and win the football game to be able to accomplish something that’s never been done here in football.”

On not winning enough of them remark, just an FYI to Gundy… The Bedlam series sits at 86-17-7… in the Sooners favor. It should also be noted that Oklahoma State has only beat Oklahoma twice in row just three times… since World War II.

On whether or not they will approach the game differently from other games:

“We won’t approach it any differently and it won’t feel any different than it did last year. We were in the same situation last year, and so our players have been in that environment and the preparation this week should be the same. There’s a lot of excitement in this state for the game. Obviously, we don’t have professional football here and it’s a fun week for everybody, but our players and our coaches have to stay focused on the task at hand.”

And I’m not sure he has the confidence level most Cowboy fans would require their head coach to have. Most coaches are out politicking their teams to play in the big game, if they have a legitimate shot. Not Coach Gundy. Gundy was asked who should play LSU in the title game, and instead of pushing for his own team, said Alabama.

 If somebody sat me down and said (I) had to make a decision,” Gundy said, “with where we’re at right now, Alabama lost to what would be the No. 1 team in the country LSU, and Oklahoma State lost to Iowa State.

“In our situation, if I was doing it fair, I don’t know how I could put us in front of (Alabama) right now.”

Not to worry Poke fans, Gundy doesn’t even have a vote in the Coaches Poll. Coaches who actually do get to vote in the poll may reconsider putting a team that their own coach doesn’t believe should be there. Hopefully Gundy didn’t shoot their chances in the foot. If he did, Im sure T. Boone Pickens is going to shoot Gundy’s foot, a couple of times.

For your viewing pleasure, the greatest press conference of all time.