Oklahoma State surges to No. 38 in ESPN’s 2026 SP+ rankings with a massive +21.7 point rebound under new coach Eric Morris.
Will Oklahoma State football finish in the top half of the conference?
Oklahoma State Cowboy has climbed the ladder of ESPN’s 2026 SP+ Rankings.
SP+ is a tempo and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency, designed as a predictive tool focused on the most sustainable and predictable aspects of the game rather than a resume-style ranking of past performance.
As ESPN’s Bill Connelly explains in his March 27th analysis of all 138 FBS teams, these preseason projections “aren’t intended to be a guess at what the AP Top 25 will look like at the end of the season. These are simply early offseason power rankings based on the information we have been able to gather.”
The formula weighs four key factors: returning production (updated for transfers and attrition), recent program history, recent recruiting (including transfers, though this carries far less weight than in past decades), and coaching change effects.
Connelly notes that comparing a team’s prior output to a 20-year SP+ baseline helps account for dramatic swings when new coaches arrive, especially those importing high productivity talent.
For Oklahoma State, the 2026 SP+ rankings offers a bit of cautious optimism. The Cowboys are projected at No. 38 overall, marking the largest single-season improvement in the country at +21.7 adjusted points per game and landing them with an overall SP+ rating of +7.1. Their projected offense ranks around 42nd nationally, while the defense sits near 52nd, solid but not elite numbers that reflect a program in transition.
Connelly notes the turnaround potential directly: “The Cowboys fielded their worst team in more than 60 years last fall but replaced Mike Gundy with Morris, who basically migrated last season’s top-ranked offense to Stillwater. That doesn’t make them Big 12 favorites or anything, but it could very well make them a top-40 team.”
This placement directly shows the impact of the coaching change to Eric Morris, who arrived after leading North Texas to a standout 2025 season.
SP+ specifically flags Oklahoma State’s historic underachievement in 2025 as a prime example of how new leadership, and an influx of transfers, can spark improvement and fast turn around.
“If you underachieved to an historic degree, like Oklahoma State did last season, a change is likely to bring with it significant improvement,” Connelly writes, noting that Morris’s move “doubly” boosts the outlook given the talent he imported. While no specific win-loss projection is detailed in the SP+ update, the ranking positions the Cowboys as a legitimate contender in the Big 12.
In the Big 12, Oklahoma State sits just outside an impressive group of eight conference teams projected 37th or better, placing the Cowboys in a middle pack situation.
Texas Tech leads the way decisively at No. 7 overall, with Connelly calling them the clear favorite as no other Big 12 squad is within 7.7 points of the Red Raiders in the SP+ metric. BYU follows at No. 18, and Utah checks in at No. 24 despite a projected regression of -10.2 points after losing longtime coach Kyle Whittingham to Michigan.
These three form the top tier, but the article describes a “big mass of potential contenders” immediately behind them. Teams like TCU and Arizona State are projected at least seven spots lower in SP+ than some media polls (such as those from ESPN’s Mark Schlabach) have them, while Kansas State, Arizona, and Houston are viewed as equally capable of contending for the upper half of the conference.
Oklahoma State’s No. 38 ranking, therefore, places it squarely in the conversation with that secondary group of Big 12 hopefuls. It trails the conference’s top three by a noticeable margin but remains within striking distance of the eight-team jam projected 37th or higher, suggesting the Cowboys could realistically challenge for a top-half finish if Morris’s offensive system translates smoothly and the defense shows even modest gains.
This projection aligns with broader SP+ trends in the Big 12, where Connelly observes the conference lacks a single dominant force beyond Texas Tech. “While there’s no one projected within 8.2 points of Miami in the ACC or 7.7 points of Texas Tech in the Big 12, the American, CUSA, Mountain West and Sun Belt are all relative logjams near the top.”
Other relevant details from the article reinforce Oklahoma State’s upside. The emphasis on coaching change adjustments gives extra reasoning to the +21.7 leap, as SP+ has grown more in the transfer-portal era to capture such changes.
Morris’s track record of elite offensive efficiency at North Texas, ranked No. 1 last season, directly feeds into the projections, even as the Cowboys’ recent history (a historically poor 2025) weighs against them in the formula. Recruiting elements play a minimal role here, per the updated weighting, meaning the immediate boost comes almost entirely from returning production under new leadership and program-health adjustments.
Overall, ESPN’s SP+ paints Oklahoma State as a team poised for a significant rebound but still navigating a crowded Big 12 landscape. At No. 38, the Cowboys aren’t projected to crash the national championship picture, but they are positioned to exceed expectations in Year 1 under Morris.
