Mike Gundy believes Sports Illustrated report helped Oklahoma State’s recruiting

It has been more than two months since Sports Illustrated released its bombshell report about all the illegal stuff the Oklahoma State football program has allegedly done over the past decade-plus. A weeklong series that was broken down into chapters called The Money, The Academics, The Drugs and The Sex, some people felt that the evidence would help expose a widespread problem across college football. Instead, it has largely been ignored.

Not only have people stopped talking about Les Miles and his so-called team hostesses (aka prostitutes), but Cowboys head coach Mike Gundy has wondered if the report actually boosted the program’s recruiting.

“I think it helped us in recruiting,” Gundy told The Tulsa World on Monday. “It benefited our program. It was interesting. We had four or five players that were really good players that started calling on us and showing interest the next few weeks after the article came out. That was the only thing I could attribute it to, because we certainly weren’t playing very good. So it was just kind of interesting.”

Gundy said Oklahoma State had 19 verbal commits from the class of 2014 before SI published the report. They have 22 verbals now. Picking up three recruits in two months is nothing out of the ordinary, but Gundy said the calls coincidentally came right after the report.

“I know people think, ‘Well, he’s lost it again.’” he said. “But the truth is, you guys, and I hear people say in marketing, any publicity is good publicity. So I thought about that and I thought, ‘I wonder if (prospects) thought, ‘Well, you know, we’ll check them out or see or whatever.’ I don’t know. It was just kind of weird. But there was interest from players that we didn’t have any interest in until that came out.”

I wouldn’t doubt it. Is the alleged activity illegal? Yes, but to 17- and 18-year-old kids some of it also sounds fun. You think high school athletes don’t want beautiful women at their disposal and teachers who wouldn’t dare give them a lousy grade? Let’s be realistic.

Helmet smack to Dr. Saturday