The Oklahoma State Cowboys took another step toward resurrecting their status as a top-tier program by clinching bowl eligibility after Saturday’s win over Kansas State.

Cowboys head coach Eric Morris said two weeks ago that his goals for the program are bigger than a bowl game. But for the Cowboys (6-2, 4-2 in Big 12), who went 1-11 last season and 4-20 in their last two seasons, he admitted they must start somewhere. The Cowboys will start with a bowl game — assuming they don’t position themselves for a chance to win the Big 12 by reaching the league’s championship game.

The game’s winner goes to the College Football Playoff.

The last time the Cowboys played in a bowl game was at the end of the 2023 season, which saw Oklahoma State lose to the Texas Longhorns in the Big 12 Championship game in Arlington.

The Cowboys went on to beat the Texas A&M Aggies in the Texas Bowl in Houston.

Cowboys Back on Bowl Game Path

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Before the past two seasons, the Cowboys went to 18 straight bowl games under former head coach Mike Gundy from 2006-23. In that span, Oklahoma State won 10 or more games eight times, won a Big 12 title in 2011 and reached the Big 12 Championship game twice.

Gundy, a former Cowboys quarterback and assistant coach, turned going to a bowl game into a expected outcome each season. Before Gundy took over, Oklahoma State had reached just 16 bowl games.

Morris has coached a team to bowl eligibility for his third straight season as an FBS head coach. With North Texas he took the Mean Green to the 2024 First Responder Bowl after leading UNT to a 6-6 season, losing to Texas State. Last season, he guided the Mean Green to the American Conference championship game, where they lost to Tulane. That set the program up for a bowl game, though he accepted the job at Oklahoma State before UNT beat San Diego State in the New Mexico Bowl.

"It feels good," Morris said to Cowboys Radio Network after the game. "A little bit of pressure relieved."

Oklahoma State is part of a pool of 12 teams in the Big 12 that are eligible for seven affiliated bowl games. The selection order for those games is the Alamo Bowl, the Pop-Tarts Bowl, the Texas Bowl, the Liberty Bowl, the Cactus Bowl, the ESPN Events pool of games and the Independence Bowl.

The former Pac 12 members —Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and BYU — are committed to Pac 12 Legacy Bowl affiliations. It is possible OSU could face one of those four teams as the Alamo Bowl, the ESPN Events pool of games and the Independence Bowl overlap.

Oklahoma State has three more games remaining, starting with a huge matchup with Texas Tech, which has one league loss and hosts West Virginia Saturday night.