Rumors are swirling around the Oklahoma State football team as they inch closer and closer to bowl season.

Instead of the rumors having to do with coach Mike Gundy's assistants leaving, this year they're including Gundy himself.

The man who started at Oklahoma State as a quarterback. The man who has been on the coaching staff ever since his playing days. The man who has built the program up from a pushover to a BCS Bowl winner.

He's rumored to leave. That's almost as likely as Boone Pickens buying a house in Norman. Neither are happening any time soon, at least in my opinion.

But his assistants? That's not as far-fetched. Too often an assistant coach has pulled up his Stillwater stakes and headed for a coordinator or a head coaching job for a different school, and it could happen again this year.

The most likely candidate of this offseason might be offensive coordinator Todd Monken, though he won't be the only one they come looking for.

"It'll start," Gundy said of other school's inquiring about his coaches. "There are probably six guys on our staff they'll want to be coordinators or something. They'll say if we hire this guy they'll score a lot of points and get a lot of yards."

This is both good and bad for Oklahoma State. Good, because of the fact that every year other school's are coming after someone on Gundy's staff, and bad because every year there's a chance that a vital part of the team's success could walk out of the door.

"I would hate to break the streak," Gundy laughed. "We joked about it last year. I'd hate to break the streak when we don't have anything to talk about during bowl week."
"I need to start my website. Hire my coaches dot com."

The biggest hit would probably be Monken deciding to leave.

His brilliance has led to three 1,000-yard passers this year while also having a 1,000-yard rusher, and he has often times been the driving force behind many of the team's seven wins, not to mention last season's Fiesta Bowl win.

"For Todd, what we've tried to do is put those guys in a position so that they won't leave until there's a job they think will put them in a position for success," Gundy said.

Monken is making a handsome salary as a coordinator in Stillwater, and only the perfect job would likely be the one he leaps at.

The perfect job for him is unknown at this time, though many have said he'd make a perfect head coach. Could he be baited into the gig at Arkansas? Or Tennessee?

"I don't know that someone like that would take a chance on an assistant," Gundy said. "I don't know what anybody thinks. Do I ultimately think he'll be a head coach? Yes. But it has to be the right situation for someone to take on an assistant. You can't just walk into that."

Of anyone on the staff, Monken's probably the most likely to take a risk on the football field, yet least likely to do so in life. Is he more likely than Gundy? Absolutely, but that isn't saying much.

Regardless, the streak has continued for another year. We have something to talk about leading up to the bowl games, so I hope you're as ready as I am for some guy named "Sources" telling us what may or may not be true for the next month or so.


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