Originally published at: Five Thoughts on Oklahoma State’s 2025-26 Basketball Season
Team MVPs, most underrated player and more.
With the money we have, we will need to catch lighting in a bottle and with a little luck and a great coach to make a run at a title here in any sport. That folks was a brutal second half of basketball. This coached team could fix its issues and showed little progression as the season went on.
“We’re not gonna have the same money that some of the other Big 12 programs are gonna have, and that’s not an excuse.”
Do we have money or naw?
Boynton first two years:
33-35 (13-23 conference record), NIT Quarterfinals
Lutz first two years:
37-33 (13-25 conference record), NIT Second Round
You know what they say. Third time (or year) is a charm 
.
Not very fair. Boynton was handed a team that had a very surprising and successful run the year before that he was a part of. Lutz got handed Boynton’s cratered out garbage from outside the program with no time to recruit from the portal or high school. Much more successful than Boynton considering the situations are not even comparable. That said, Lutz had historically bad defense this year. Won’t win in the Big XII that way.
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The biggest question mark for me throughout this season and now at the end is whether or not Lutz even wants to be here. His hiring was relatively uninspiring with little excitement. I don’t feel like he’s as active in the campus/Stillwater community as Boynton was or other coaches are. It seems like he spends a good amount of time trying to manage team chemistry, player happiness, and discipline problems, resulting in poor play on the court. It’s just seems like it’s not a cohesive fit between him and the University. I’m pulling for the guy but I wonder if there’s any remorse on both ends in regard to fit.
Lutz also won less conference games this season with what was considered a better overall and more depth roster compared to last season. So I think the comparison is totally fair.
If we’re going to go the route of not playing defense at all. Then I’d say he should probably invest his time into finding some seriously excellent shooters that go at least 7 deep.
Lou Gudino is touted as the Defensive guru on the coaching staff. After this year’s performance, if Gudino stays, we will know if Lutz is not serious about defense.
He needs D to enable the pace he wants. It is hard to go fast, pulling the ball out of the net and inbounding. A good example of this is what we seek in Arkansas.
It gets lost in the lore but Coach Sutton missed the Dance 3 years running… with all the upheaval in college sports today, Lutz has improved from year one to year two. If memory serves, the team seemed to change when Jennings went out and that’s why two more years are important.
If he has the money, put the money on character/heart; find a Tony Allen, Fred Burley, Brooks Thompson, Andre Williams to clean the glass and play lock down defense. Hopefully Lutz has the money to get a difference maker…
oSu
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Curious, was the Big XII better this year or last because oSu has a much higher SOS this year, and beat tourney teams like aTm, and beat Auburn which is still playing in the NIT (some of that is luck of draw but…)?
oSu
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I suppose it could’ve been better than last year. However, OSU was considered to be better than last year. Even if the conference got better and OSU did. Still doesn’t take away from the fact that OSU still won less conference games than last season.
I go by the 80 point rule for our conference. OSU went 5-11 in conference games where they gave up 80+ points. If they could’ve just played 3 games where they don’t constantly crap the bed defensively they’re most likely in the Tourney and not the NIT. Like I said, if we’re not going to play defense Lutz better find some excellent shooters where he can rotate at least 7 guys without missing a beat.
It will be interesting to see what the stay/go numbers will look like in a few weeks.
oSu
My concern is that this year’s team was supposed to be stacked with offensive weapons, and Coach Lutz talked about defense being a weakness the entire season. When there’s an identified weakness that doesn’t get ‘fixed’ in an entire season that is shared by the team, that falls on the coaching staff. Also I agree it will be interesting how many stay and how many go to the portal, that will tell us a lot.
If nothing else, it was great watching Chris Coleman develop in front of our eyes. Hope he finds opportunities to keep maturing his game, if that’s what he wants to pursue.
A few thoughts on next year:
Hire Fallah as a GA, as a position coach for the big men, and to establish the role he touched on briefly as a liaison for the international guys.
Find a way to keep Cleary in town. That dude’s a dawg, and continuity at the PG will make coach’s job a lot easier with the new blood coming in.
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Ultimately, yes, but it’s kind of like painting a room and it dries and it’s just not the right color. Maybe you can change out some of the decor and salvage it to make it look good, but maybe it’s just an ugly color and you can’t make it work. It’s painter’s fault for getting the wrong color, but there’s not anything to do about it except redo the whole thing. Coach may have picked the wrong people and it’s unfixable until he can get new guys.
An entire team of them?
Sure. They don’t mix or you’re missing the glue guy that makes it work or whatever. Sometimes the die is cast and there’s nothing more you can do after that.
I think my larger point is that for me it is not just the W/L that matter, it is seeing the right combination of guys on the floor, and it is seeing issues or lack of skills at the beginning of the season be replaced by skills and lack of issues later. And we haven’t seen that in a long time in men’s basketball (or football for that matter). Hopefully it will be different in football.
But we’ll have more clarity soon when we see who chooses to stay and who chooses to leave, and whether any of our recruits ask to be let out of their commitment.