Oklahoma State Needs to Bench Alan Bowman Again
Oklahoma State hasn’t won a football game in two months, and it needs a new quarterback to change that.
The Cowboys started the 2024 campaign 3-0 with hopes of winning the Big 12 and even competing for a national championship. Instead, they enter their Week 12 bye week without any hopes of a winning season or making a bowl game.
In what has been the worst season in Mike Gundy’s two decades as head coach, one thing has remained constant: OSU’s unwillingness to change. Sure, the Cowboys changed quarterbacks out of a bye week, but after Garret Rangel’s injury, Alan Bowman has been the only quarterback to receive a meaningful snap.
With both the second and third-string options from the preseason out for the year, it would make some sense to roll with the veteran if there were no other options. However, true freshman Maealiuaki Smith was a highly touted prospect coming into Stillwater and has been getting reps in practice consistently since Rangel’s injury.
Good performances from Bowman could be a reason to keep him out there. Despite being in his final year of college football, if he is helping the Cowboys succeed, it would be understandable to keep him out there instead of throwing a freshman into the fire.
However, Bowman hasn’t played well at any point in conference play. OSU benched him ahead of the BYU game because he wasn’t performing to expectations.
In the nonconference finale at Tulsa, Bowman threw for 396 yards, five touchdowns and one interception. That game was the last time Bowman had a positive touchdown-interception ratio.
Smith has been inserted into garbage time of OSU’s past two games and led two of the best drives in that span. He has completed 7-of-10 passes for 103 yards but threw a pick to end the game at TCU.
Still, Bowman-led offenses have resulted in 27 total points over the past two games. With a bye week to prepare for Texas Tech, it would be inexcusable for OSU to start Bowman over OSU fans’ lone reason for optimism.
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Ivan is a sports media student at Oklahoma State University. He has covered OSU athletics since 2022 and also covers the OKC Thunder for Inside The Thunder and Thunderous Intentions.