POSSE Magazine - Winter 2014

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THE WINTER TEMPERATURES INDICATE BASKETBALL

AND WRESTLING SEASONS ARE UPON US.

Our men’s and women’s basketball teams welcome players we are accustomed to watching as well as a mixture of brand new faces. PART OF THE PLEASURE OUR FAITHFUL FANS EXPERIENCE EACH YEAR IS THE BLENDING OF RETURNING PLAYERS WITH VERY YOUNG ONES FROM ACROSS THE NATION AND THE WORLD. This process ensures the growth and success of our teams.

Coach John Smith also has a blend of experience and youth on our wrestling team. Once again, the Cowboys enter the season highly ranked and have scheduled a rugged list of opponents leading up to the Big 12 and NCAA Championship tournaments this spring.

Greetings, OSU fans.

The cold weather reminds us why the Sherman Smith Training Center and the Mike and Anne Greenwood Tennis Center were built. Just another important step in our quest to provide the very best training environment for all of our athletes. STILL TO COME ARE PLANNED IMPROVEMENTS FOR SOCCER, BASEBALL AND EQUESTRIAN.

Thank you very much for your loyal and generous support of our efforts to build championship teams in all of our sports. WITH YOU ALL THINGS ARE POSSIBLE, WITHOUT YOU WE ARE NOTHING.

I want to congratulate Coach Gundy and the football team on a great road victory in Bedlam and wish them luck in the Ticket City Cactus Bowl!

GO POKES!

MIKE HOLDER DIRECTOR OF INTERCOLLEGIATE ATHLETICS Former

Coach

PLAY BOOK

DIFFERENCE MAKER WITH A PAIR OF TOUGH-YARDAGE TOUCHDOWNS, senior tailback Desmond Roland helped lead the Cowboys to a comeback Bedlam victory. Ben Grogan’s 21-yard field goal in overtime sealed OSU’s 38-35 win over OU, propelling Mike Gundy’s squad to a 9th-straight bowl appearance.

COVER PHOTOGRAPHY BY PHIL SHOCKLEY

Desmond Roland

PHOTO / BRUCE WATERFIELD

At Oklahoma State University, compliance with NCAA, Big 12 and institutional rules is of the utmost importance. As a supporter of OSU, please remember that maintaining the integrity of the University and the Athletic Department is your first responsibility. As a donor, and therefore booster of OSU, NCAA rules apply to you. If you have any questions, feel free to call the OSU Office of Athletic Compliance at 405-744-7862. Additional information can also be found by clicking on the Compliance tab of the Athletic Department web-site at www.okstate.com

Remember to always “Ask Before You Act.”

Respectfully,

BEN DYSON

ASSISTANT ATHLETIC DIRECTOR FOR COMPLIANCE

ORANGE PRIDE & JOY

Each fall, a number of OSU fans and automobile enthusiasts get to show off their rides outside Boone Pickens Stadium at the pregame HALL OF FAME BLOCK PARTY . Held prior to the OSU-Texas Tech football game, this year’s COWBOY CAR SHOW featured another cool collection of orangethemed custom vehicles, from motorcycles to muscle cars and tricked-out trucks.

First place in the show was awarded to Dick McGuire’s 1933 FORD VICKY. A 1955 CHEVY owned by Jim Moseby scored second place honors, while Glen Elliott’s 1980 CHEVY LUV took the bronze. The Fan Favorite award went to Cody Dean and his 1953 CHEVY

POSSE POKES

POSSE MAGAZINE STAFF

VICE PRESIDENT OF ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT / MARKETING KYLE WRAY

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF / SENIOR ASSOCIATE ATHLETIC DIRECTOR KEVIN KLINTWORTH

SENIOR ASSOCIATE ATHLETIC DIRECTOR / EXTERNAL AFFAIRS JESSE MARTIN

ART DIRECTOR / DESIGNER PAUL V. FLEMING

ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR / LEAD DESIGNER ROSS MAUTE

PRODUCTION ASSISTANT / PHOTOGRAPHER BRUCE WATERFIELD

ASSISTANT EDITOR CLAY BILLMAN

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS BRUCE WATERFIELD, PHIL SHOCKLEY, GARY LAWSON, BOSTON RED SOX

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS WADE M c WHORTER, RYAN CAMERON, GENE JOHNSON, CONTRIBUTING WRITERS CLAY BILLMAN, AUSTIN CHAPPELL, JOHN HELSLEY, TAYLOR MILLER

ATHLETICS ANNUAL GIVING (POSSE) DEVELOPMENT STAFF

ASSISTANT ATHLETIC DIRECTOR / POSSE DIRECTOR ELLEN AYRES

PREMIUM SERVICES DIRECTOR KARYL HENRY

PUBLICATIONS COORDINATOR CLAY BILLMAN

PROGRAMS COORDINATOR / BENEFITS MARY LEWIS

EVENT COORDINATOR / GAME DAY PARKING MANAGER JOE NELSON

ATHLETIC DEVELOPMENT ASSISTANT STEPHANIE BOESE

ATHLETICS MAJOR GIFT DEVELOPMENT STAFF

SENIOR ASSOCIATE ATHLETIC DIRECTOR / DEVELOPMENT LARRY REECE

DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT / ATHLETICS MATT GRANTHAM

PROJECT MANAGER SHAWN TAYLOR

OSU POSSE

102 ATHLETICS CENTER STILLWATER, OK 74078-5070 405.744.7301 P 405.744.9084 F

Donations received may be transferred to Cowboy Athletics, Inc. in accordance with the Joint Resolution among Oklahoma State University, the Oklahoma State University Foundation, and Cowboy Athletics, Inc.

POSSE magazine is published four times a year by Oklahoma State University Athletic Department and the POSSE, and is mailed to current members of the POSSE. Magazine subscriptions available by membership in the POSSE only. Membership is $150 annually. Postage paid at Stillwater, OK, and additional mailing offices. Oklahoma State University, in compliance with Title VI and VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Executive Order 11246 as amended, and Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 (Higher Education Act), the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, and other federal and state laws and regulations, does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, religion, disability, or status as a veteran, in any of its policies, practices or procedures. This provision includes, but is not limited to admissions, employment, financial aid, and educational services. The following have been designated to handle inquiries regarding non-discrimination policies: Director of Equal Opportunity, 408 Whitehurst, OSU, Stillwater, OK 74078-1035; Phone 405-744-9154; email: eeo@okstate.edu.

This publication, issued by Oklahoma State University as authorized by the Senior Associate Athletic Director, POSSE, was printed by Royal Printing Company at a cost of $1.115 per issue. 8.175M/December 2014/#5477.

POSSE magazine is published four times a year by Oklahoma State University, 121 Cordell North Stillwater, OK 74078. The magazine is produced by OSU Athletics and University Marketing, and is mailed to current members of the POSSE Association. Membership starts at $150/year and includes benefits such as the POSSE Magazine and member auto decals. POSSE annual funds contribute to student-athlete scholarships and operating expenses, which are critical to helping our teams stay competitive. Gifts of all sizes impact all areas of athletics. Postage paid at Stillwater, OK, and additional mailing offices.

PHOTOS / BRUCE WATERFIELD

WINTER 2014

Weight OF THE

THE W RLD

THE LOCATION OF OSU’S STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING

CENTERS are somewhat symbolic. They can be found at the ground level of the west end zone, and below the court of GallagherIba Arena. In other words, the two strength centers are at the very foundations of their buildings.

They are, in fact, the very foundation of OSU’s athletic successes.

For most student-athletes, the successes of their college careers are dictated by their dedication to their foundation: their strength and conditioning training. It is the bridge that helps propel them from a prep star with potential, to a successful Big 12 athlete. The effort they put in away from the spotlight, under the direction of OSU’s strength, speed and conditioning staff, has a direct impact on their successes in the arena of competition.

There is an OSU staff of professionals overseeing their weight training, helping athletes through psychological barriers, helping them rehabilitate from injuries. And they are vital to every varsity sport on the OSU campus.

TRUMAIN CARROLL — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR FOOTBALL AND TRACK

MALLORY FOWLKES — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR SOCCER, SOFTBALL AND EQUESTRIAN

NICK HOHEISEL — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR WOMEN’S BASKETBALL AND MEN’S/WOMEN’S TENNIS

ROB GLASS — ASSISTANT ATHLETIC DIRECTOR-STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING

OSU’s speed, strength and conditioning staffs are usually the first in the building — either building. It is not uncommon to see a crowd of student-athletes heading out of the athletic center for a 7:30 a.m. class — after a workout in the weight room under the direction of OSU staffers.

Strength coaches, as they are known in the business, never seem too terribly interested in climbing the ladder. More than perhaps any other branch of the athletic department, they witness the growth and maturity of OSU’s student athletes. They witness it first-hand, and, in fact, are in many ways responsible for it.

And when you are responsible for the foundation, it’s hard to walk away.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

TRACY BALDWIN — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR BASEBALL, WOMEN’S GOLF AND CHEER

JOEL TUDMAN — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR FOOTBALL AND TRACK

GARY CALCAGNO — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR WRESTLING AND FOOTBALL

JAKE MANZELMANN — ASSISTANT STRENGTH AND CONDITIONING COACH FOR MEN’S BASKETBALL AND MEN’S GOLF

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

PHOTOGRAPHY BY GARY LAWSON WINTER 2014

SoCal To Stillwater

STORY BY WADE McWHORTER PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

HELEN HODGES

is admittedly a late bloomer when it comes to Oklahoma State athletics.

Sure, her parents, the late Dillon and Lois Hodges, graduated from Oklahoma A&M in the 1940s, and Helen earned a degree from OSU in 1979. But Hodges’ passion lay in other things prior to a chance encounter several years back.

TODAY, HODGES is a proud BOONE PICKENS STADIUM SUITE HOLDER and TRAVELS FROM HER HOME IN SAN DIEGO TO STILLWATER to cheer on coach Mike Gundy’s Cowboys on Saturdays in the fall.

Hodges’ story starts out in northwestern Oklahoma, on a farm west of Hennessey, where her family raised beef cattle and wheat.

For Hodges, growing up an only child on a farm was an extraordinary experience. She recalls helping feed the cattle, as well as gathering and moving them, running them through the chute and getting them ready to sell.

And that experience resulted in something that surely made her the envy of young girls everywhere.

“The best part was I got a pony!” Hodges said. “We bought her when I was fiveyears-old from some neighbors, and she was spoiled. Apparently they let her do whatever she wanted to do, and that was not satisfactory to me. So we had a number of discussions, and finally she would go wherever I wanted her to go. We became fast pals, but we did have some problems at the beginning of our relationship.”

Hodges spent hours riding her four-legged friend, Judy, to help round up cattle, and later she would add driving a tractor in the summers to her list of chores.

“I loved being in the country,” Hodges said. “There were some limitations because I was 17 miles from my school. It was pretty easy for my parents to say, ‘You’re not going into town.’”

Following her graduation from Hennessey High School, it was Hodges’ time to leave the farm life, so to speak, and she followed her parents’ footsteps to Stillwater and OSU.

As a freshman living in Willham Hall, Hodges was confident of two things — she loved political science, and she wanted to be a lawyer.

But her father had some advice for her — and as it turns out, father did know best.

“My dad said, ‘Helen, what are you going to do if you don’t go to law school? You really should get over to the business college and get a degree where you can

remembered the land she roamed growing up just happened to lie underneath the Vance Air Force Base training area and the allure of machines overhead.

“I’m out there on the farm in the middle of nowhere, and I look up and see those military trainer jets and I think ‘Wow, wouldn’t that be cool!’” Hodges said. “When I got to college, I didn’t think much of it, but I got to talking with my dad and told him it would be really cool to learn how to fly. And he said, ‘Well why don’t you do that?’ He offered to pay for it, so I decided to do it.”

Hodges made the most of that experience as well. She obtained her private pilot’s license, and after earning her degree in December of 1979, stayed another semester so she could join the OSU Flying Aggies team.

“I just loved that — it was the best,” Hodges said.

get a job if you don’t go to law school,’” Hodges said. “And so I took his advice. I went over to the business college, and I decided accounting was the best major for me.

“I struggled in accounting — it was a challenge for me. But I did get a degree, and I did go to law school. And that accounting degree got me every job I ever had.”

It turns out, that wasn’t the only piece of rewarding encouragement Dillon Hodges had for his daughter.

While an undergrad student reflecting back to her days on the farm, Hodges

And Hodges was part of the best as the Flying Aggies won top honors at the 1980 National Intercollegiate Flying Association competition, a skills event that tests such things as power-on and power-off landings, aircraft recognition, cross-country navigation using only instruments and one of Hodges’ most memorable tasks, a “bomb” drop where participants are challenged with dropping a piece of balsa wood with a tail from the flying plane into a barrel on the ground.

Accounting degree and pilot’s license in hand, Hodges was ready for her next step — to make good on her dream of becoming a lawyer.

That passion was also born of Hodges’ experiences growing up. In the summer following her high school graduation, she worked for BOB BARR, a lawyer and friend of the family, filling in for Barr’s secretary for several weeks.

“Helen makes an unbelievable commitment to be in Stillwater six or seven Saturdays a year to cheer on the Cowboys.” i

MATT GRANTHAM

Hodges said Barr’s practice “looks exactly like you’d expect a lawyer’s office in downtown Hennessey, Okla., would” and sounds like something out of a John Grisham novel.

“You had a little reception area where the secretary sits, there’s always a pot of coffee on, and people walking down Main Street are just stopping in,” Hodges said. “And behind the closed door is the lawyer with his law books and his big desk.

“Bob Barr meant the world to me, and he helped me and my family in so many ways — and I saw that he helped other people. And I darn sure didn’t want to be the secretary — I wanted to be the lawyer! I thought it was interesting and would be challenging, and it was. (Barr) was helping people — he was truly a counselor.

“THAT’S WHY I’M A LAWYER, BECAUSE OF BOB BARR.”

Upon receiving her degree from the University of Oklahoma Law School in 1983, Hodges didn’t immediately begin a career in law — she first spent two years in tax accounting for Arthur Andersen.

Her first big break into law would come during the Oklahoma City Penn Square cases in the 1980s. The judge in those cases was Hodges’ former law school dean, and she clerked for him, working on the accounting end of the cases.

“Like I said, I’ve always used that accounting degree that I got at OSU,” Hodges said.

With her appetite for law whetted, Hodges headed west to San Diego in 1987 and joined one of the nation’s leading plaintiffs’ law firms. Hodges and a group of lawyers from that firm subsequently formed a new firm, now known as Robbins Geller Rudman & Dowd LLC.

Nearly three decades practicing law in San Diego has proven quite fruitful for the small-town Oklahoma girl, who specializes in securities litigation and has been recognized as one of the city’s top lawyers.

Hodges has been involved in numerous multi-million dollar class action suits, but the pinnacle of her career — at least to this point — began in 2001 when Hodges

focused on the prosecution of Enron, where a record $7.3 BILLION has been recovered for investors.

Hodges’ group represented a class against Enron, but the lead client was the University of California Regents, whose pension fund had invested in Enron and suffered a loss of over $100 million. Several big banks had chosen to settle, but after long and hard litigation and preparing for trial with those who didn’t, an appellate court threw the rest of the cases out just a few weeks before trial in 2007.

“It is absolutely a highlight,” Hodges said. “We were very successful for investors — we recovered over seven billion dollars. It was huge, and it took thousands of hours. We had a huge team, and I was one of the senior people on the team of lawyers.

“To me, it was great fun. After that case, no other one was as interesting to me. It was so big — big banks engaging in convoluted, complex financial transactions with Enron. Then you had a bankruptcy

Left to right, WALTER TONEY, BETTY RATLIFF, DOROTHY TONEY, STEVE BARNES, HELEN HODGES, ANN PHILLIPS, MATT MCLANDRICH, PATTY CORSINI and TOM CORSINI

case and all sorts of people bringing private cases — it was just a big tangle. We went against what I felt like were the top lawyers in the country, and that’s part of what made it interesting — the challenge.”

Hodges is still looking for the next big challenge in her career, but in the meantime, she’s found yet another passion — Cowboy football game days in Stillwater.

And in that regard, she’s somewhat making up for lost time.

“I’m sure when I was in college I went to some football games and maybe a few basketball games, but that was about it,” Hodges said. “I was pretty focused on school and academics.”

Hodges’ foray into football fandom began in the late 2000s when she was invited as a guest of Scott Sewell, who serves on the OSU Foundation Board of Trustees, to the Boone Pickens Stadium suite of Ross and Billie McKnight.

After attending her first couple of games in the McKnight’s suite, the OSU Foundation began offering Hodges suite tickets that allowed her to bring one guest. Among those Hodges brought along were her friend Ann Phillips, a 1943 Oklahoma A&M graduate and big OSU supporter who had been a neighbor of her mother’s at Spanish Cove Retirement Village in Yukon, Okla., and PATTY CORSINI, Hodges’ best friend from high school.

AND AFTER A FEW TASTES

OF THE SUITE LIFE, HODGES WAS HOOKED.

“I just thought that atmosphere was the most fun,” Hodges said. “I enjoy watching the game, I enjoy watching the band and we just always have a great time.”

Good times presented a problem for Hodges, however.

Not long after her first visit to the Boone Pickens Stadium suites, Corsini — who famously worked her way into the suite of the stadium’s namesake — inquired of Hodges, “Gee, I really had a great time. Could we do that again?”

“And I had to say no because I didn’t get that many invitations,” Hodges said.

“So literally, I got a suite so that I could invite all my friends.”

Hodges became a BPS suite holder in time for the 2013 season, and she can’t imagine a better way to spend Saturdays in the fall than traveling back to Stillwater and having the ability to accommodate her growing list of game day companions — the 91-year old Phillips and several others from Spanish Cove, Corsini and other friends from her high school and college days, cousins, aunts, uncles, you name it.

“It’s a perfect time to be able to visit and connect with my people, catch up with them and enjoy the game day experience all at once,” Hodges said. “It’s a party where I don’t have to prepare the food or move the furniture!”

And fans like Hodges are a blessing to OSU football as well.

“Helen makes an unbelievable commitment to be in Stillwater six or seven Saturdays a year to cheer on the Cowboys,” said OSU Athletics’ Director of Major Gifts Matt Grantham. “I would guess traveling from San Diego to Stillwater is quite a challenge for a weekend trip, but I can’t remember not seeing her at a game since meeting her and that shows you her level of dedication.

“She’s an inspiration to all the Cowboy faithful and such a humble person. WE HAD TO BEG HER TO DO THIS FEATURE BECAUSE WE KNEW IT WOULD INSPIRE OTHERS.”

HELEN HODGES AND ANN PHILLPS

HELEN HODGES AND TERRY SLAGLE HELEN HODGES AND PATTY CORSINI

HOW DO MY POINTS RANK?

OSU ATHLETICS PRIORITY POINT SYSTEM

The PRIORITY POINT SYSTEM provides a fair, consistent and transparent method of providing benefits to donors in exchange for their financial investments in OSU athletics.

DONORS GAIN POINTS THREE WAYS: CONTRIBUTIONS: All current and lifetime contributions (cash or stock) are worth 3 points per $100 donation. Planned (deferred) gifts in the new Leave a Legacy Endowment Campaign will receive 1 point per $100.

COMMITMENT: Donors will earn one point each year for purchasing season tickets (one point per sport annually), as well as one point for each year of POSSE donations.

CONNECTION WITH THE UNIVERSITY: Donors (or their spouses) who are OSU Alumni receive a one-time 10 point bonus, as do OSU faculty/staff and letterwinners.

Points never diminish and will carry over to subsequent years.

Donors retain all previously earned Priority Points in their giving history. For questions about the POSSE Priority Point System, email posse@okstate.edu or call us at 405.744.7301.

MOONLIGHTING

From Student-Athlete to Spirit Rider (and Back)

STORY BY CLAY BILLMAN | PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

THERE’S AN ALL-AMERICAN WAITING ON THE SIDELINES AT BOONE PICKENS STADIUM, READY TO TAKE THE FIELD WHEN CALLED UPON.

CONFIDENT. DRIVEN.

Pulses quicken as the Cowboy offense moves into scoring position. It’s only a matter of time before this standout student-athlete is thrust into the spotlight.

A touchdown is scored. Pistols fire. The band plays. Arms wave. Following the extra point, the public address announcer updates the score as referees and players clear the field. Children of all ages crane their necks to get a better view. Nearly 60,000 orange-clad fans know what’s next, many shouting along in unison.

“Heeeeere … comes

With that, the beloved black horse charges out from the stadium’s southwest corner toward midfield before making a counterclockwise loop back to the tunnel. Brandishing an orange OSU flag, the proud Spirit Rider sits tall in the saddle, a picture of poise amid the clamor of gameday.

Underneath that black cowboy hat is Katy Krshka, a senior from Yukon, Okla. This isn’t her first rodeo, so to speak.

She just happens to be the most decorated rider in the history of the OSU equestrian program. Krshka has earned a total of five first-team All-America honors across both western disciplines (horsemanship and reining), with one season of competition remaining.

The 2014 season marked the first time a member of the Cowgirl Equestrian squad served as the Spirit Rider. Before Krshka tried out for the job, the Saturday side-gig had to be approved by her coach, Larry Sanchez.

“Katy called me in the spring and asked if it was possible for a team member to ride Bullet,” the coach recalls. “She wanted to make sure it was doable before she made any commitment to try out. That’s who Katy is as a person. She’s going

… BULLET!”

to make sure the process is done right. When she talked to me, I told her that the biggest issue was if there were any conflicts between competition days for our sport. It just so happened that our schedule this year did not conflict with any home football games.”

“It’s my last semester of undergrad and I have some easier courses to take, so I thought I could handle the workload if I were possibly chosen,” Krshka explains. “Larry was all for it as long as I knew equestrian came first.”

Sanchez was confident Krshka, one of four team captains chosen by her teammates, could handle the extra demands.

“I know she’s great academically. She does very well in the classroom. She takes care of her business. She’s very responsible. She honors her commitments. I’ve always believed that your busiest students are your best students, and she’s still been able to achieve at a very high level. Knowing that about Katy, I knew that she was capable of managing both being the Spirit Rider and continuing to win All-America honors at the end of every season.”

The equestrian season runs from late September through mid-April. However, the bulk of OSU’s home competitions are scheduled in the spring semester. That’s when Sanchez’ second-ranked squad will look to win its fourth-straight Big 12 championship and compete for the National Collegiate Equestrian Association team title.

With the coach’s blessing, Krshka sent an application to Spirit Rider coordinators Ty and Jennifer Cunningham. The Cunninghams are both former Spirit Riders who took over the program in 2005. Bullet resides at their rural Tulsa home.

The tryout process included riding the actual horse, as well as a personal interview.

“I went to the arena, rode Bullet and then did a personal interview with them,” Krshka says. “We rode without stirrups while carrying the flag. If you haven’t held a flag in Oklahoma wind…it’s a task to ride a horse at the same time.

“The interview was pretty casual, but you just talked with them about what your hopes were being on the team and stuff. I’d always grown up riding horses, and to be able to try out for something new involving horses was fun for me. Two years ago, my cousin (Reed Kyle) rode Bullet, so that sort of got me thinking. I had talked to my mom about it a couple times and thought this would be a cool thing to do.

PHOTO / GARY LAWSON

“The Spirit Rider is such a legacy here. It’s an honor to be able to carry on that tradition, and I felt that it would be a really fun experience.”

Jennifer Cunningham says a key attribute they look for in the Spirit Rider is experience in handling horses in various situations.

“Being in the horse industry, Ty and I have watched Katy grow up on a horse, so when I received her application, we were very familiar with her skills and abilities. I’ve watched her show in several Youth World competitions, and so I’ve seen her in very nerve-racking situations. And obviously she went on to be very accomplished with the OSU equestrian team. She just holds herself together so well. My confidence in her is just limitless.”

Krshka’s coach agrees.

“YOU PROBABLY COULDN’T FIND A BETTER RIDER THAN KATY ON THE OKLAHOMA STATE CAMPUS,” SANCHEZ SAYS. “So I knew when it came to the actual tryout that she would

be hard to beat. Katy rides. That’s what she does. That’s her passion. That’s what she’s done her entire life. And she’s ridden more horses than you could count.

“She came through her youth career having to ride all different types of horses, which is what they have to do once they get into our program. They ride very nice ones — and there are some that are not so nice — so she was very prepared when she came in because of her background.”

Krshka’s family is well known in equine circles. Her parents, Tom and Jackie, founded Krshka Quarter Horses, a training, breeding, show and sale barn in Yukon. Jackie, an accomplished trainer and former competitor, is a past AQHA Horsewoman of the Year honoree. Katy’s late grandfather, JACK KYLE, is enshrined in the American Quarter Horse Association Hall of Fame.

“My grandfather was very influential in the Quarter Horse industry and helped draft the very first western riding pattern still used today, so it definitely goes back in the family. I have strong roots there.”

Continuing the tradition, Katy is a former AQHA Youth World Champion, four-time youth Reserve World Champ and 11-time Congress Champion. The impressive list of accolades made her a coveted college prospect.

“Katy was the top western recruit in the nation that year,” Sanchez says. “Schools from all over the country wanted her and were offering her full-ride scholarships for her to commit. WE WERE VERY FORTUNATE THAT HER FAMILY LIVES IN OKLAHOMA AND HER DAD IS AN OSU GRADUATE AND HER MOM BLEEDS ORANGE. HER BROTHER WENT HERE. SHE’S BEEN AN OSU FAN FOREVER. Katy is very close to her family, and that played into it. Oklahoma State also has the caliber of program that she knew she could win team championships with, as well as thrive individually.”

Bullet is an American Quarter Horse with the registered name “LEAGUERS COUNTRY ZIP.” The 17-year-old gelding has ten years of gameday experience

under the saddle, and according to the experts, the horse is exceptional.

“The situation that the Spirit Rider is put in at the football games is not normal for a horse or rider,” Sanchez says. “It’s amazing what that horse tolerates and puts up with. He’s a phenomenal individual. And with a confident rider, it makes it even more possible to get through stuff like that.”

“Bullet does his job phenomenally well,” Krshka says. “I’m so glad I get to ride him. He is a saint. It takes a special horse to be able to do what he does.”

Crowd noise, shotgun blasts, referee whistles, blaring music, Paddle People and sideline media are just a few of the many on-field distractions that can unsettle even the most veteran horse and rider. Despite a number of pre-season practices and run-throughs with the Cowboy Marching Band, nothing can replicate real in-game scenarios.

BULLET

We all know there would be no football program at Oklahoma State University without OSU’s talented coaches and players who make up the OSU Football Team. However, there are many things beyond the team itself that help make each home game a special experience for all those in attendance. There is the extremely gifted band performing in the stands and on the field during halftime. There are the dedicated cheerleaders and pep squads, the fans and our famous mascot, Pistol Pete. And there is one more thing —the thunder of hooves racing around the stadium as Bullet and a Spirit Rider celebrate each touchdown.

A Spirit Rider has been celebrating OSU Cowboy touchdowns at home football games since 1984. In 1988, OSU bought its own black horse. Oklahoma State’s own Center for Veterinary Health Sciences has provided Bullet’s veterinary medical care for years. In 2005, OSU took that care to a new level when Dr. Lyndi Gilliam began accompanying Bullet to every home game.

environment. Things at a football game are never predictable and it is easy to forget a horse is involved. Although he is AN EXCEPTIONAL ANIMAL, one mistimed or wrong move and we could have an emergency on our hands. I’m just there as a precaution, a safety net. I work closely with Ty and Jennifer Cunningham, Bullet’s caretakers, to make sure that Bullet is as happy and safe as possible.”

Precautions are also taken to ensure the Spirit Rider who rides Bullet around Boone Pickens Stadium after each touchdown is a highly qualified, experienced horseman or horsewoman. Katy Krshka of Yukon, Okla., has been selected as Bullet’s rider for the 2014 Football Season.

Katy is a senior OSU student majoring in Animal Science with a business option and minoring in Agricultural Economics. After graduation, she plans to pursue a master’s degree in international agriculture.

“I have been riding horses since I was 6 or 7 years old,” says Krshka. “I grew up on a horse training and breeding operation and was showing horses by the time I was 8 years old.”

Katy, a member of OSU’s Equestrian Team, was one of 15 students who tried out to be considered as Bullet’s rider.

“It’s important to OSU to keep Bullet safe at all times,” explains Dr. Gilliam, an equine veterinarian at OSU’s Veterinary Medical Hospital. “By being with Bullet at home games, I can attend to his needs should he get hurt. It takes a very special horse like Bullet to perform in a game day

“It was quite a process. We had to fill out an application, ride Bullet, and then be interviewed by Bullet’s caretakers Ty and Jennifer Cunningham,” adds Krshka. “I’m excited to be part of the five member Spirit Team. It’s an honor to be part of something that is such an OSU tradition. I’ve shown horses in front of a lot of people but not that many. It will probably be an adrenaline rush. This is an amazing opportunity and I’m very thankful to be carrying on this type of legacy.”

“In reality both Katy and Bullet are athletes,” says Gilliam. “They both need to be in top shape to perform at their best. As part of the Equestrian Team, Katy works out with a personal trainer to make sure she is in shape. At OSU’s Veterinary Medical Hospital, we make sure Bullet gets the proper wellness care to keep him healthy. He is on a routine vaccination and parasite control program and is well fed with Purina feed. He receives a pre-season exam from head to tail by our board certified specialists to make sure he is sound for the upcoming season. From equine internal medicine and surgery to sports medicine and rehabilitation, we have specialists trained in the latest techniques to take care of Bullet should he have any health problems.”

“We always hope that Bullet won’t need our care during a football game but it’s a comfort knowing we have such a highly specialized team right here on campus ready with the latest techniques and products in equine veterinary care should the need arise,” adds Gilliam. “Game day would not be the same without Bullet and we take great pride in ensuring that we do our job to make sure fans can hear ‘Heeere comes Bullet!’ at every home game.

For more information on OSU’s equine veterinary care, call 405-744-7000.

TODD HOLBROOK, REED HOLYOAK, MIKE SCHOONOVER, LYNDI GILLIAM

PHOTO / BRUCE WATERFIELD

PHOTO COURTESY OF OSU SCHOOL OF VETERINARY MEDICINE

REED KYLE WITH BULLET

“You have to be a wellrounded person that’s used to getting things thrown at you.”

— KATY KRSHKA

“There’s no simulation,” she adds. “There’s nothing like having all those people in the stands. It’s an adrenaline rush for sure. I don’t think I remember the first time.”

“I trust Katy’s abilities to keep Bullet in the best mindset possible during all that,” says Sanchez. “There were some things this year that were different, as well. The new turf threw him a curveball in the first few games.”

Over the summer, a new artificial surface was installed at Boone Pickens Stadium. The updated design features a bold black and orange OSU brand at midfield, along with a matching Big 12 logo at the 25-yard-lines, blackon-orange end zone lettering and a black border defining the out of bounds area.

“Horses don’t have depth perception, so when he is running over that black on the field, it has to look like a hole to him,” Krshka says. “When we practiced prior to the first game, you could tell he was nervous about it. The black definitely scares him a little bit. He didn’t want to go over the logo.”

“HE DOES NOT LIKE THE BIG 12 THAT’S PAINTED ON THE FIELD,” Jennifer Cunningham says. “He’s never liked the Big 12, but he especially doesn’t now because it’s surrounded in black rather than white. A few times, maybe unbeknownst to other people, he has tried to jump over the logos, but Katy just sat right in the middle of him, and she did well.

“Katy knows how to handle a horse and does an excellent job,” she adds. “Ty and I have obviously both been on this horse’s back in different scenarios, and so there’s no way to replicate what you do on the field. It’s just a moment-by-moment situation. It’s not something you can practice. You just have to handle it as it comes. She’s done great, and we’ve got a great team that’s on the ground helping her out.”

Sanchez has noticed the same thing from the bleachers.

“You can’t run a horse through what he thinks is a big hole like that and not expect him to try and save himself and the rider,”

he says. “But Katy’s just got an incredible, natural talent of feeling a horse and being able to sense things sooner than anybody else as far as what that horse might do. That is what helps with her success.

“I’VE HAD PEOPLE COME UP TO ME AND SAY, ‘MAN THE SPIRIT RIDER THIS YEAR IS EXTREMELY GOOD!’ I’M PROUD TO SAY, ‘YEAH, SHE’S ONE OF OURS. SHE’S A FIVETIME ALL-AMERICAN.’”

“Even though what you’re doing seems simple, you have to think through every part of it,” Krshka says. “It may not seem as complicated as equestrian, but you definitely have to have a plan of what you’re doing, because there’s everything thrown at you out there — there’s people, there’s the band … I hit a pylon. You have to be a well-rounded person that’s used to getting things thrown at you.”

The coach admits he gets a bit anxious watching his star student-athlete in such situations.

“Yeah, I’m a little nervous. Anything can happen when you are horseback. Anything can happen in practice, too. I want her to finish her college career with a bang. I want us to win a fourth Big 12 Championship. I want to win the National Championship in her senior year. But I’m happy to know that she can look back in 20 years and say, ‘I rode Bullet.’

“So many young people across the state of Oklahoma dream of riding Bullet. When we realized it was possible for Katy to keep her commitment to the team and do it, why wouldn’t we want her to have that experience and have that joy of being the Spirit Rider?”

Krshka says she wouldn’t have it any other way.

“It’s the best seat in the house. I get to sit on a horse and watch a football game.

HOW MUCH BETTER CAN IT GET?”

By andWord By Deed

MICHAEL COBBINS’ ASCENSION FROM A LONG, LANKY HIGH SCHOOL STANDOUT IN AMARILLO, TEXAS, TO OKLAHOMA STATE’S INSIDE ENFORCER AND VOCAL LEADER HAS SEEN ITS SHARE OF UPS AND DOWNS.

He’s been a part of squads ranked as high as No. 5 in the country, logged 35 minutes in the Cowboys’ overtime victory over second-ranked Kansas in 2013 and played on multiple NCAA Tournament teams.

On the flip side, he’s been on OSU teams that hovered near the bottom of the Big 12 standings, struggled with drama in the locker room and even suffered through a seven-game losing streak. Despite the wide range of emotions experienced over that stretch, Cobbins has come to know the Oklahoma State program, coaches and philosophy more than most associated with the team, making him a FAN FAVORITE and leader going into his senior season.

STORY BY AUSTIN CHAPPELL

BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

“I’ve had memories here in Stillwater that will literally last a lifetime,” Cobbins said. “It’s been a journey and an experience that will shape me for the rest of my life. This place is my home.”

Cobbins’ close bond with OSU began at Palo Duro High School in Amarillo, where he established a stellar career as one of the top big men in the state. The program’s historical success had been limited to a 3A state title in 1956. But Cobbins’ presence in the paint helped the Dons reach the regional finals in 2009 and helped the program stack up with a plethora of powerhouses.

With notable averages of 18.3 points and double-digit rebounds during Palo Duro’s playoff run, Oklahoma State coach Travis Ford took notice and initiated talks to make Cobbins a part of the Cowboys’ recruiting class. Despite his thin, sub-200-pound frame, Ford saw him as a potential star, primarily on the defensive side.

“Michael is really good at being a versatile defender, and that’s one of the first things I noticed about him.” Ford said. “He blocks, he protects and he guards, and when a player has a sense of those things before he even plays in college, you know you’ve got someone who can become an allaround player.”

Ford and the Oklahoma State coaching staff reached out to Cobbins early on and became the favorite to land the FOUR-STAR RECRUIT.

an injury during the summer between his junior and senior sea sons kept him off the court for an extended amount of time, Cobbins was forced to consider other options, includ ing GEORGIA TECH, MEMPHIS and OKLAHOMA.

Oklahoma State stayed in touch, though, and con stantly made contact

with Cobbins despite his nagging injury. With his grandparents located only two hours away in Clinton, Okla., Cobbins attributed his final decision to Stillwater’s close proximity to his support group and friends at home and a tight-knit relationship formed with Ford and the OSU coaches.

“They always stayed in communication with me, even when I got hurt during the early part of the recruitment process,” Cobbins said. “They still stuck with recruiting me and talking to my family all the time. They really made me feel like a part of the team, even when I hadn’t even arrived here yet.”

After redshirting during his first year on campus, Cobbins’ presence at Oklahoma State exploded, as he appeared in all 33 games of the 2011-12 season. He chipped in 15 MULTIPLE-BLOCK GAMES, A TOP-FIVE REBOUNDING MARK IN CONFERENCE PLAY AND SEVERAL DOUBLE-FIGURE SCORING PERFORMANCES.

The following year he played well enough to earn All-Big 12 honorable mention and Big 12 all-defensive team honors.

In addition to his experience gained on the court, Cobbins was also able to gain knowledge from relationships with some of the Cowboys’ most prolific leaders, Marshall Moses. “Part of what really got me prepared to step up and have a leadership role

on the team came from being under guys like Marshall and Matt (Pilgrim),” Cobbins said. “Going up against them and seeing what they gained from experience in games and in practice helped me figure out what I needed to work on and improve.”

Cobbins also kicked off the start of his career by forming close connections with other key members of his freshman class, as evidenced by a YouTube video created with former Cowboys Markel Brown and Brian Williams. In the video, the three newcomers acted out an MTV Cribslike presentation of Oklahoma State’s brand new state-of-the-art locker room.

The trio showed the relationship’s stability when they were named captains for the 2012-13 season. Despite Brown’s departure for the NBA, Cobbins said the friendships remain intact.

“When you’re out on the court with Markel, and even when you’re on the bench, you play with a completely different drive,” Cobbins said. “I loved whenever Markel would get a dunk because it would make me celebrate like I just had a dunk. That’s stuff that you don’t ever forget.”

Cobbins attributed that same emotion to former Cowboy and current Boston Celtics guard Marcus Smart , who played with Cobbins for both seasons of his dynamic college career.

“It was a different type of energy with Marcus and Markel, especially with the extreme energy and extreme amount of

heart they both gave,” Cobbins said. “When you played with them, you could actually feel the energy coming off of them, as weird as that sounds.”

The beginning of Oklahoma State’s 2013-14 season was meteoric, as the Cowboys entered the year the No. 8 team in the country and reeled off seven-consecutive wins.

But during a game against Robert Morris late in the team’s non-conference schedule, Cobbins suffered a season-ending injury on a freak inbounds play, a moment he describes as the lowest of his career so far.

“THE FIRST THING THAT WENT THROUGH MY MIND WAS DISAPPOINTMENT,” Cobbins said. “My family was in the crowd that night, so I felt like I had let them down in some ways.”

“After that, there was the anger and questioning. My mind was just all over the place as soon as it happened, and I just hated being injured and missing out on playing ball.”

Oklahoma State ended up winning that game by a convincing 26-point margin, but the score didn’t reflect the future travails of life without Cobbins.

After a narrow defeat at Kansas State in the conference opener, Oklahoma State reeled off victories over Texas, West Virginia and TCU, giving the team a revitalized sense of confidence heading into a road matchup at Kansas.

Cobbins said the success leading up to the team’s game against the Jayhawks stalled the feeling of not being able to con tribute, but after the Cowboys suffered a heart-break ing two-point loss in Lawrence, every thing sank in.

“It was an overwhelming feeling at first, but as time went on, I guess I kind of went into, well, I wouldn’t really call it a denial phase, but more of a desperate hope to get back out there,” Cobbins said. “During the Kansas game, though, I was just like, ‘Man, I gotta get there,’ and I remember thinking how crazy it was that I wouldn’t get to play with those guys anymore.”

“That game, it really just brought tears to my eyes, even before the game started. I really didn’t know what to think.”

The Cowboys responded to the defeat at Kansas by posting a win over West Virginia, but eventually began a sevengame slide during the most critical stretch of the team’s conference slate. And with five of those defeats coming by a gut-wrenching six points or less, the pain of Cobbins’ injury not only deepened within himself, but with the team as whole.

Without being able to suit up during games, or even practice, Cobbins was left without a specific role for the first time in his career. However, as he had done during his commitment process, he went to his family, friends and virtually anyone who could provide him with a sense of motivation.

His first source of support came through his family, which included parents, grandparents, cousins and siblings all flocking to Cobbins’ need. He then added MICHAEL PATTERSON, a close friend and high school teammate, as well as Brown and Williams to the mix. With an established support group, Cobbins made the decision to confront his coaches about how he could help during his injury.

“Coaches can only do so much as far as on-the-court coaching goes, but as far as off the court, the players have got to have somebody who can relate to them,” Cobbins said. “They need somebody who has been in their shoes and knows the player aspect of the game, so I

PHOTO ABOVE / PHIL SHOCKLEY

WINTER 2014

felt like I could give them both of those, mainly because I saw so much more than just being on the court.”

After seeking motivation from friends and family, Cobbins and the Oklahoma State coaching staff developed the idea of using him a team motivator.

“Mike was a very important part of that team, so when he went down, we felt sorry for him,” Ford said. “But at the same time, we couldn’t feel sorry for the team. We needed him to contribute in any possible way, and with him being one of the most outgoing and vocal guys on the team, we knew he would be a great fit to get this team going.”

of conference games looming, he called a private team meeting at his house and laid everything out on the table.

“Basically, I told the guys that we can’t step outside the boundaries and go past our limits, and that we have to trust everybody,” Cobbins said. “We had to know that, ‘If he’s going to do this, then I’m going to do that,’ and, ‘I’ve got your back, and you’ve got my back.’”

After the team’s seven-game losing streak, the Cowboys responded with a four-game stretch of victories in conference play, highlighted by a 72-65 upset over fifth-ranked Kansas in Stillwater. The contributions stemming from Cobbins’

Cobbins said the goal is the same as it has always been before each year.

“Everybody’s got to be on the same page and make sure they’re doing the same thing, and the guys already know that,” Cobbins said. “This might be one of the most close-knit teams I’ve been on since I’ve been here, which is surprising considering the number of new guys we have.”

“It’s basically a whole new change, but

So, Cobbins became the team cheerleader. During practice, he made himself a constant presence by encouraging teammates and doing his best to physically help with workouts. Cobbins was even featured on ESPN’s SportsCenter for his “Dunk Face,” displayed after one of Williams’ highlight plays last season.

Despite not playing a minute, Cobbins was able to take his force previously on display in the paint to the bench, where he served as the primary source of encouragement, even with teammates who weren’t in the game.

“I felt like I was definitely making a contribution, especially with those guys who were on the bench with me,” Cobbins said. “I knew that there would be a time and chance for them to get in, and I knew they would have to bring it once they got in.”

A key initiative of Cobbins’ newfound philosophy came two games into the Cowboys’ seven-game slide after a close home loss against Baylor. With a key stretch

enthusiasm became visible to the team, the Oklahoma State fan base, and most importantly, himself.

Now, heading into his senior season, Cobbins is HEALTHY, REVITALIZED AND READY TO ADD TO HIS MOTIVATIONAL CONTRIBUTIONS WITH SUCCESS ON THE COURT. With seven members gone from the 2013-14 squad, Cobbins also has the chance to revive the chemistry created with former teammates and help it blossom within the Cowboys’ group of incoming talent.

“I’ve had memories here in Stillwater that will literally last a lifetime.” — MICHAEL COBBINS

I REALLY LIKE THIS TEAM, AND I LIKE WHAT WE CAN DO.”

Have you known someone who seems to consistently make lemonade out of lemons? They lose their job and find a better one the following week. They are jilted by a girlfriend and then end up with a much prettier sweetheart.

But how about turning tragedy into triumph? Tragedy is defined as a dreadful event, calamity or disaster. That’s a far more challenging endeavor.

Some 50 years ago, in 1964, the United States launched military attacks against South Vietnam in response to an attack against American naval vessels. Henry Bellmon was serving as governor of Oklahoma.

Turning Tragedy into

STORY BY GENE JOHNSON

Triumph

That same year, Oklahoma State junior Bob Swaffar (6-foot-9 and 200 pounds) was expected to be a key player on coach Henry Iba’s Cowboy basketball squad.

As a senior at Tulsa’s Will Rogers High School, Swaffar had been recruited by Princeton, Tulsa, Navy, Kansas and Oklahoma State. PRINCETON ALLAMERICAN BILL BRADLEY paid him a visit and was so impressive that Swaffar decided he wanted to go there. However, Swaffar’s father thought it was too expensive, and he didn’t want his son to “turn Ivy League” and become a snob. Princeton charged $3,000 per semester for tuition and only offered Bob a $300 per semester scholarship.

Eddie Sutton, then a coach at Tulsa Central High School, had seen Swaffar play numerous times and recommended him to Mr. Iba. So the Cowboys became his second choice. It was a place where his dad had graduated with honors. Mom wanted him to go to KU.

With straight blond hair and a handsome yet rugged face, Swaffar excelled in academics and had a quick, albeit a little ornery, wit. Joining him that upcoming season were six returning seniors, three who had been three-year starters, plus an outstanding sophomore prospect and a cast of other quality teammates.

Mr. Iba had exceedingly high hopes for the squad, according to local media. He told Volney Meece of The Daily Oklahoman that “I think we have the makings of a real fine ball club.”

Lavish optimism was unusual for Mr. Iba.

However, on a dreary cool October evening, tragedy struck.

Swaffar and this writer were teammates, daily battling against one another trying to earn the starting center position.

Following a late afternoon practice, I ate supper at the athletic dining hall in the basement of Bennett Hall and then walked over to my room in Gallagher Hall, picked up my books and proceeded to walk to the library. After studying for several hours, I returned to my room. I noticed my roommate wasn’t there, and I assumed he was studying with some of his fraternity brothers at the Lambda Chi house.

After a few minutes, the phone rang. My watch said 10 p.m. We used the pay phone in the hall outside our room so I hurried to answer it on the fourth ring.

“What are you doing?” my sister Linda Kay, an OSU sophomore, asked nervously.

“I just got back from the library. Why? Is everything Okay?” It was unusual for her to call me that late.

“I just heard on the radio that Bob Swaffar had an accident, something about his arm.”

“What? Are you serious?” I asked, letting her words soak in.

“I’m not kidding.”

“Wow!” was all I managed to say. “I’ll see what I can find out,” and hung up the phone. I walked the short distance to the rooms underneath the north portion of the football stadium where six basketball players, including Swaffar, lived in three different rooms. As I opened the hallway door, I saw 10 or 12 guys, mostly basketball players, along with two wrestlers and a baseball player. They talked in quiet, almost hushed tones. When they saw me, several nodded.

“What happened?” I asked.

THERE WAS SILENCE. No one wanted to explain the tragedy that had just occurred. Finally, teammate Jimmy Tom Watson answered.

“Bob lost his balance, fell forward and got his arm caught in the extractor, and the @&**** machine snapped it off midway between the shoulder and the elbow. Blood is splattered everywhere in there, looks like a war zone,” as he nodded toward the laundry room. “ Doc (Dr. Donald) Cooper and Hass (teammate Gary Hassmann) went with him in an ambulance to the Stillwater hospital a little while ago.”

I didn’t respond. No way did I want to see that room. Swaffar had been doing a load of clothes while he and Hass studied. The laundry room was equipped with an industrial washer, dryer and extractor to launder practice and game attire for all sports. After the clean gear was removed from the washer, it was put into the extractor, a large barrel-shaped apparatus with a smaller barrel placed inside that had numerous 50-cent piece sized holes on its sides. With a push of a button, the inside barrel spun up to 2,500 rounds per minute. It was enough force to squeeze water from the washed items before they were put into the dryer. To stop the spinning, the same button was pushed to disengage the power, and there was a footbrake to quickly slow it down.

I learned that Swaffar’s roommates, Les Berryhill, Watson, and Skip Iba, plus teammate Jack Herron, were first on the scene. Berryhill and Watson wrapped the severed limb tightly in white towels in an attempt to slow the bleeding. Hass, who had been in the room studying with Swaffar when the accident occurred, shouted for someone to get ice.

Teammates Bill Beierschmitt and Herron located a medium-sized washtub and filled it with cold water since there was

“I think we have the makings of a real fine ball club.”

MR. IBA

no ice available. For a few minutes longer I listened to the quiet, almost reverent, discussions. Figuring there wasn’t anything else to be learned, I walked slowly back to my room. A nightmare! I thought. That evening Swaffar was rushed to the OU Medical Center in Oklahoma City. I walked back to the field house and phoned my sister. I didn’t sleep that night.

Swaffar’s arm was successfully reattached by a team of surgeons, one of the first surgeries of that type in the U.S.

Following the accident, he was resilient. He never appeared to let it get him down. How he felt on the inside, none of us will ever know. His basketball career, tragically, was over.

In the years that followed I’d see Swaffar occasionally, usually at a basketball reunion. In 2005, he attended the 40th reunion of our 1965 Big Eight championship team. He was still the same smiling, slender guy I knew, except that now he had a full white beard and looked like a trim Santa Claus. He had limited use of his reattached right arm and hand and would shake hands with his left.

Fast forward eight years to 2013. I decided to drive to his home in Austin, Texas, to catch up and maybe write a story.

It was a perfect May morning, warm but not hot, birds were chirping, blue sky with large fleecy white clouds and a slight breeze. With the help of my GPS, I drove to his home, which is located in the historic neighborhood just a short walk from the University of Texas campus.

Swaffar greeted me with a hearty lefthanded handshake and a hug. He dwarfed his slender wife, Janet, by well over a foot.

From Swaffar’s very comfortable front porch, he began his story with his arrival at Oklahoma State.

“Sam (assistant basketball coach Sam Aubrey) notified me that I’d be living in room 105. I thought that was in the field house,” he said. “Mom drove me over, and we arrived at noon so the business offices were closed. I couldn’t find a room 105, but finally located it on the second floor,

down a long hallway, underneath the football stadium. The room was flooded and half of the windows were knocked out. It was a mess.

“MOM WASN’T SURE ABOUT IT. SHE THOUGHT MAYBE SHE’D BETTER TAKE ME HOME, BUT I CONVINCED HER TO LET ME STAY. Les Berryhill, who was scheduled to be one of my roommates, showed up the next day or so. Our freshman year we didn’t have heat, and the roof always had a slight leak, so I attached a wire to the ceiling with a plastic cup to catch the drops,” he added.

Soon Paul (teammate Paul Labrue), another roommate, moved in. The room was huge; it previously had been an equipment storage area. We had a lot of great times there. The three of us furnished our home-away-from-home with found rugs, a refrigerator, a couch, lamps, all kinds of stuff.”

Guys who lived beneath the stadium were aptly referred to as stadium rats.

Before Swaffar’s senior year at OSU, assistant athletic director Moose Johnson, Mr. Iba’s right-hand man, came over to inspect his room. “We’d hung an old parachute from the ceiling and a few old Playboy pictures in the back — made it into a real party room. Moose reported back to Mr. Iba that the ‘damned place looked like a brothel!’”

The night after the spring semester was over, when Swaffar was a senior, he and several guys decided it would be fun to drop water balloons from the top of the stadium on the press box side.

“You remember the year before there was somewhat of a riot the night school was out. So we knew the university was on alert, and we weren’t trying to hit anyone, just have some fun and let off steam. Also, there were some old fluorescent bulbs lying around and they made fun noises when they hit the ground.”

Before the group knew what was happening, five police cars raced in. “Looked like Miami Vice,” remembers Swaffar. “We tried to run away, but they caught us and took us to jail. Sam had to bail us out. I’ll never forget it! ”

On playing for Mr. Iba, Bob recalls, “I didn’t have much interaction with him when I was playing — he was somewhat remote. He didn’t always approve of everything I did, but I’m glad I got to play for him. I got to know him better after I quit playing. ONE PRACTICE I JUMPED AND STUFFED A REBOUND, ALL IN ONE MOTION, AND I REMEMBER MR. IBA SHAKING HIS HEAD AND SAYING, ‘WOW!’ I KNEW HE LIKED THAT.”

Asked about the accident that severed his arm, Swaffar said, “I was in a state of naïveté, never a person to plan very far ahead, so I rolled with the flow. I wasn’t particularly interested in a basketball career, didn’t even know if that was a possibility for me or not. NBA players only made about $50,000 or so back then.”

During his senior year Swaffar took an interest in politics and became president of the student senate and vice president of the student body.

“I didn’t mind being in a leadership role but didn’t like all the behind the scenes strategy that takes place to get a person elected,” he said. “People tend to get corrupted in a leadership role. Those folks behind the scenes have no ethics.”

Who was his biggest influence?

“I’ve been fortunate to have good coaches, sincere friends and parents who cared. I needed discipline because I tended to get in trouble a lot. Lots of people influenced me.”

Swaffar graduated from OSU with a degree in mathematics. He decided to

serve a year with the Peace Corps. About eight months before his training began he took a job with Conoco in Ponca City, in the computer department. It was a position that would influence him later.

The couple treated me to a tasty lunch of broiled sea bass, asparagus and gluten free cake topped with fresh whipped cream. The Swaffars, who married in 1977, dined off the same plate.

“This is a habit I picked up in Ethiopia when I was in the Peace Corps,” Bob said. “It’s kind of cozy and saves on washing dishes.”

He taught math for a year to Ethiopian seventh graders. “It was a rewarding experience except I got a tapeworm and my weight dropped to 175 pounds before I finally got rid of it — not an enjoyable experience.”

Returning from Ethiopia, Swaffar taught computer science one year at OSU, then worked two years for Sun Oil in Dallas as an associate computer analyst. He then moved to Austin where he worked for the University Texas from 1972 to 1988 as a system analyst and programmer while earning two master’s degrees: computer science and architecture. In 1988, he was appointed senior systems analyst, adjunct professor and director of computer laboratories for the school of architecture at Texas. He held that position until his retirement in 2003.

Hey,” Swaffar said as he stood up, “let me show you my pottery studio.”

I knew he made ceramic pottery or, as I learned, was a potter. Last year my wife had purchased for me a large swirled turquoise vase Swaffar had made. It was an absolutely stunning piece.

We exited through a side door and walked toward the back. The studio itself was an architectural masterpiece, designed, of course, by the owner. It is a rammedearth structure with a loft with both areas totaling 1,200 square feet.

The structure has large glass windows that invite abundant sunshine and, when opened, a breeze. The studio’s design complemented that of the main house. Once inside I immediately saw, on both levels, hundreds of pieces of ceramic work: jars, pots, cups, mugs, bowls and creamers. His pottery wheel was on the lower level, and his craftwork came in an assortment of styles and colors.

“You notice none of my pieces come with a handle,” he said. “You need two good hands to successfully attach a handle, and I only have one. I used to say I was the only one-handed potter in Texas. Now I understand there are many potters with temporary injuries or some sort of disability so I’m now the tallest onehanded potter in Texas,” Swaffar said with a slight smirk.

“The reason I retired early is to use some of the physical strength I have left to develop a ceramics business. It can be strenuous, but I like the physical challenge. I’ve dabbled around with it for a long time and got a minor in ceramics at OSU but have only been serious the past 10 years or so. Knowing one day my daughter would go to college, I felt I couldn’t make a living as a potter so I became a computer guy. But I’ve always enjoyed taking a lump of clay, actually a ball of mud, and through a very lengthy process, producing something that is long lasting and combining the elements of art and 3D work, putting things in a kiln, firing it and getting out one or two things that you really like. It

“

I’ve always enjoyed taking a lump of clay. and producing something that is long lasting.” i

BOB SWAFFAR

takes a long time to become a good potter, and I’ve got a long way to go.”

Following my compliments on his work, he became very generous.

“Go ahead and pick out a couple of things for yourself,” he said.

“Really?”

I picked three items: two coffee cups and a drinking tumbler. I looked at Swaffar for approval. He acquiesced.

“Sure. I knew you couldn’t count.”

A pristine 1982 Chevrolet El Camino (half car and half pickup) is parked in his driveway, which he uses to haul his ceramics to arts and crafts shows. “It’s getting more difficult for me to carry all those boxes of pottery. It seems like they get heavier each time.”

Swaffar’s daughter, Jennifer, recently moved from Norman and is a nurse anesthetist. He has a 6-foot-4 granddaughter, Acacia, who attends Colorado State University on a volleyball scholarship. CSU, an NCAA Division I program, was ranked seventh in the country at this writing and is consistently ranked in the top 10. Between Bob and Janet, they have 10 grandchildren.

Besides nearby Barton Springs and some occasional travel, Swaffar enjoys solitude in his studio (five days each week), staying in touch with friends and neighborhood politics. He has served as president of the neighborhood association.

Driving north out of Austin, I thought about Swaffar. Certainly his accident had been a shocking event, but, in the greater scheme of things, did it slow him down? Yes, as far as his basketball career was concerned, but no, on what he had accomplished with his life: family, Peace Corps, studying computers and architecture, rising to the top of a department at a major university, becoming a darn good potter and enjoying those things important to him.

I think we would all agree that he definitely triumphed over tragedy.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Visit Bob Swaffar’s website, LOSTINAUSTIN.COM , and buy someone you love a piece of Bob’s art. Be sure and ask for the Cowboy discount.

The author, GENE JOHNSON , has recently published a book entitled “LIVING MY DREAMS” about the 1965 OSU men’s basketball team that was crowned Big 8 champions. Copies are $15 and can be purchased by contacting Gene Johnson at osu52johnson@yahoo.com

RED, WHITE, BLUE

STORY BY JOHN HELSLEY PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

JOE NELSON

BID FAREWELL

THE HUT THAT SERVED AS HOME DURING A SECOND TOUR

TO

IN VIETNAM, pausing to grab but one souvenir from an otherwise hellish experience. One token from there…that always kept him focused on what awaited here in the U.S.

Pistol Pete.

“We didn’t have doors because of the rocket attacks and they didn’t want to have anything impeding us from getting into the bunkers,” said Nelson, now the parking manager and event coordinator for the POSSE.

“A flap was my door.”

Upon that flap, a piece of canvas two feet wide and four feet long, Nelson had sketched his own Oklahoma icon, a source of pride and a sense of home, which he longed to see again while bullets and mortar fire filled the days.

“I MANAGED TO COME BY AN ORANGE MAGIC MARKER AND A BLACK MAGIC MARKER,” NELSON SAID. “AND I PENCILED IN A PICTURE OF PISTOL PETE ON THIS BIG PIECE OF CANVAS, THEN I COLORED IT IN WITH THE MAGIC MARKERS. AND THAT WAS MY DOOR.”

“So when it came time to come home, I took my knife out and cut him down.”

Back in Oklahoma, that Pistol Pete canvas hung over the work bench in his garage, until he came to OSU for a job.

Like Jeff Hunt, a veteran and student coach assisting ROB GLASS in OSU’s strength and conditioning department. At a strategic locale in Iraq, Hunt sat atop a Hesco Barrier, a multi-layered wall used to protect troops in conflict, and listened in long distance, very long distance, while his wife Meagan gave birth to the couple’s first child back in the States. Hours after his daughter Hailey’s birth, Hunt was informed he’d been named 2nd Division Marine of the Year.

Nathan Peterson once harassed enemy quarterbacks from an end spot on the Cowboys’ defensive line. He graduated with a degree from OSU in management. Then he suited up again — as an officer with the Marine Corps. Peterson is back with the Cowboys, serving as a defensive grad assistant on MIKE GUNDY’S staff, still leading young men.

Jemal Singleton grew up military, born in Incirlik, Turkey, the son of an Air Force sergeant. So it shouldn’t have been a surprise when Singleton attended the Air Force

AND ORANGE

His wife, Pam, had always suggested framing it so once on campus, Nelson figured it was time to fully give his Pete his due.

“When I came to work at OSU and had an office, I framed it and prominently placed him on the wall,” Nelson said. “He’s something I’m very proud of.”

With the recent observation of Veteran’s Day (Nov. 11), Nelson and many others across campus with a military influence took time to pause and reflect and appreciate all who served this country in the name of freedom.

Academy, played at the Academy and prepped at the Academy for a life flying fighter jets. Except the Air Force Academy also fueled a passion in Singleton for coaching, eventually leading him to OSU and Mike Gundy’s staff as running backs coach.

THEIRS AREN’T THE ONLY STORIES OF SERVICE AND SACRIFICE THAT SURELY TOUCH EVERY CORNER OF CAMPUS AT OSU. But they are a sampling of how the military life has influenced — and continues to influence all those who claim to be Cowboys.

JOE NELSON , above left , and OSU REGENT CALVIN ANTHONY. in front of “the door.”

Jeff Hunt did a buddy a favor, driving him to see a Marine recruiter.

Hunt wasn’t at all interested, just giving a friend a lift. After attending high school in Arkansas City, Kan., he’d scored a baseball scholarship to a junior college and was more than happy to keep playing ball.

“I had a buddy who wanted to go talk to a recruiter,” Hunt said. “He didn’t have a car, so I drove him to the recruiting office and they started talking to me instead of him. Next thing I knew, I was signing the papers.”

Hunt wasn’t coerced and wasn’t tricked. He recounts no magic words that swayed him to sign on with the Marines. But there was something tugging at him from within, something calling him to a higher cause.

“That was the biggest deal for me, belonging to something,” he said, “belonging to something bigger than myself and having a purpose. I never really had that. I always played baseball and I enjoyed that. But this was something bigger.”

THE UNINTENTIONAL MARINE

And

it

proved to be much bigger, with Hunt embracing the Corps and his expanding role through two missions in Iraq and another in Afghanistan.

Each deployment was different. The first, way out in western Iraq, essentially pitting Hunt and his pals against an invisible enemy, charged with clearing roads of IEDs — improvised explosive devices — to offer safe travel for the troops that followed.

The second deployment sent Hunt’s battalion to northern Iraq, engaging more towns and people, and some threats of a more personal nature, although the explosives remained the focus.

“WE BEGGED FOR A TOE-TO-TOE GUNFIGHT,” SAID HUNT. “THAT’S WHAT WE’RE TRAINED FOR. THAT’S WHAT WE WANT. We’re going to run to the bullets. But when they don’t play by those rules — they won’t stand up to us toe-to-toe, because they’re going to lose — IEDs were the way they chose to fight.

“That was always the biggest threat, and the not-knowing was difficult.”

It was in Iraq, Feb. 2, 2007, that Hunt had a day from heaven in a living hell.

One moment, he was sharing the birth of Hailey with Meagan; another he was told he’d been named Marine of the Year.

“Very cool experience,” he said. “You always look back and think there were 100 more Marines more qualified than I was to hold an award like that. Nevertheless, I was very honored and it was a very cool experience.

“IT WAS A BIG DAY.”

After Hunt’s second tour, he returned to the U.S. and was sent to Marine Combat Training Battalion, serving as an instructor for three years. Men learn how to be a Marine in boot camp. They learn how to fight like Marines in the combat training battalion, studying hand-to-hand tactics, weap-

that would prove useful in Afghanistan, where Hunt and his men were the front line of the western-most push, resulting in many more confrontations.

“They were more willing to fight,” Hunt said.

Meanwhile, Hunt was climbing the ladder of rank, which came with added responsibility.

And stress.

“My first deployment, I was a PFC (Private First Class); the second a sergeant,” he said. “I was about the Marines to the left and the right of me when I hopped on that bus or that plane. I kissed my wife the first time and told her bye, then I kissed my wife and my kids bye the second time.

“As my third deployment came, I was telling parents and I was telling other men’s wives and their kids goodbye. And they were looking at me, because I was the one who was supposed to bring them home.”

Hunt led a group of 55 men into the wasteland of western Afghanistan. And he had no intention of leaving a single one behind.

“That was my main goal, bring those men back,” he said. “I’d been through a couple already. I knew what to expect. I knew how my young guys were feeling. But anytime you go anywhere, your goal is to bring all your brothers home. No matter what other mission you have or what other goals you have, that is the ultimate goal.” The goal was met. All 55 men returned safe

After that tour ended, Hunt returned to his wife and two children, Hailey and her sister Heidi. And Meagan was pregnant with a third girl. Dad made it back a week before Hope was born — on 11/11/11, Veteran’s Day. He returned to a message, too.

“When I got home,” Hunt said, “my oldest daughter said, ‘Dad, don’t ever leave again.’ I was about seven months out from having to make a decision to get out or reenlist. That made it a pretty easy decision for me.

“I was told a long time ago that there’s no bigger impact in a girl’s life than her dad. And if you’re not the impact, somebody else will be. So it was a pretty easy decision for me. I got out, we did a whole lot of praying, and we felt like we were led to be here at Oklahoma State.”

Hunt has a son now, too, Jimmy. They all packed up and moved to Stillwater, with dad returning to the classes he’d started at that junior college so many years before. He got a job, too, working for OSU’s agricultural department, doing some farming. With his sights set on athletics, however, he pressed for an opportunity to meet Glass, and eventually got it, and stuck. He keeps pushing towards his degree and he keeps pushing athletes to be their best in the weight room.

“I THINK THIS IS WHAT I REALLY ENJOY, BEING ABLE TO MAKE AN IMPACT IN SOMEONE’S LIFE,” he said. “I hope I’m doing that in some way, even if it’s just one person. I really feel like this is what I’m supposed to do. It’s what I feel I’m led to do, with God’s calling. I’m hoping to make the best of it.”

DRAWN TO SERVE

Nathan Peterson

arrived at OSU as a coveted recruit from Tulsa Union, then lived up to billing with a standout career as a Cowboy from 2004-07. Peterson stands sixth on the school’s career quarterback sacks list and eighth in tackles for loss. And he earned All-Big 12 recognition as a senior.

And by then, his vision for the future was clear, yet not at all the typical college player’s dream of chasing NFL play days and paydays.

Peterson’s pursuit: becoming a Marine.

The U.S. was imbedded in the Middle East, carrying out Operation Iraqi Freedom. Peterson was drawn to help.

doing anything wrong. It was something where I was upset with myself because of how I looked at it before. Then after meeting some people and some friends of mine who went and served, I came to realize how important it was. And it became important to me.

“It was an idea I had gotten after my junior season. And I had it in the back of my mind, and I couldn’t really kick the idea. And I could tell it wasn’t going to go away. I got the feeling that if I didn’t do it, I’d probably regret it the rest of my life.”

Peterson graduated with a management degree in 2008. Three years later, as an officer, he stepped into the Taliban hotbed of Afghanistan. A Marine 1st Lt., Peterson discovered a different world, marked not just by strife and conflict, but by children with the simplest of wants and needs.

“Children who all they would ask for, the whole time we were there, was a pen and some chocolate,” Peterson said. “If you give a child over there a pen, you’ve made their day. It’s amazing, how little they have.

“THE HARDEST THING FOR ME WAS SEEING SOME OF THE STUFF THE CHILDREN HAVE TO GO THROUGH OVER THERE.”

“I HAD THIS URGE TO KIND OF DO MY PART,” Peterson said. “There were a lot of people my age who were involved and stepping up and serving. There was a time when I was more young and immature and I didn’t look at that as something I should be doing, because I was in college and playing football. I looked at it completely different, being immature.

“Then I realized I should do my part as well. I’m not saying people who don’t are

There was tragedy, too. Peterson lost a friend and one of his men, LANCE CPL. CHRISTOPHER PHOENIX “JACOB” LEVY, who was killed on patrol while tracking Taliban fighters who had attacked their compound days before. LANCE CPL. CODY EVANS and CPL. CHRISTIAN BROWN, two more of Peterson’s men, were severely wounded and left double amputees.

Peterson returned to the U.S. with a deep respect for all who serve. And for country.

“It absolutely changed how I look at things,” Peterson said. “Going overseas, you realize how great it is here and how bad it is in other parts of the world. To get caught up in the day-to-day, get up, go to work… sometimes you feel sorry for yourself because you had a bad week or your job’s not great at the time.

“It gives you a great appreciation for everything we have. It’s amazing what we have here. That’s something I try to remind myself of when I have a bad day or I’m feeling sorry for myself. I think of all we have.”

THE COWBOYS HAVE PETERSON. AGAIN.

Following his discharge in December of 2012, Peterson headed home — not to Tulsa, but to OSU.

He was added by Mike Gundy as a quality assurance coach under defensive coordinator Glenn Spencer a month later. Now a graduate assistant with the Cowboys, he says he’s back where he belongs, having fulfilled one pursuit and now finding another, to help shape young men for the next phases of their lives.

“I love it,” Peterson said. “I’ve said it, and it’s not something I just say, it’s the only place I want to be. This is my home. I’m from Tulsa, but Stillwater is my home. I think this is the greatest place on earth.”

FLIGHT PLAN AMENDED

Jemal Singleton grew up military, as the son of an Air Force sergeant, and with a brother who also served.

So he knew the military life… to an extent.

It took football to open his eyes further, with the Air Force Academy recruiting Singleton out of Taft High School in San Antonio, where he’d been a local star and an all-state player as a senior.

“I almost feel bad saying this, but coming up through high school, I didn’t know the Air Force Academy existed,” Singleton said. “I didn’t know they had a college football team or anything like that. It wasn’t until I got some recruiting letters that it became an option and something that really intrigued me.”

Singleton’s intrigue only expanded.

He played running back at Air Force, serving as co-captain of the 1998 squad, earning honorable mention All-Western Athletic Conference recognition as a senior. He earned a bachelor’s degree in social sciences from the Academy in 1999. And he cherished the experience.

“It was a chance to play Division I football. It was a chance to get a phenomenal education,” Singleton said. “And it was a chance to have a lifestyle that I grew up in and enjoyed growing up in. A chance to go be an officer in the United States Air Force was a pretty neat deal for me. My father was enlisted for 20 years.

“So the opportunity to do kind of everything I wanted to do in my life, the Academy offered

“I’VE FLOWN GLIDERS. I’VE JUMPED OUT OF AIRPLANES AND PARACHUTED,” SINGLETON SAID. “I’VE GONE THROUGH BASIC SURVIVAL TRAINING. I’VE GONE THROUGH A LOT OF DIFFERENT THINGS YOU NORMALLY WOULDN’T EXPERIENCE AT A DIFFERENT INSTITUTION.

“So for me, it was unbelievable. It helped me develop as a man in different ways, whether it was my discipline or my leadership skills, it just helped me so much.”

AND IT HAD SINGLETON ON TRACK TO BE A FIGHTER PILOT. His slot was reserved for training, with a future of flying awaiting. Except a funny thing happened on the way to the tarmac. Before shipping out for jet training, Singleton was flying Cessnas in a program called Introduction to Flight Training. During that time, he worked with the USAFA Prep School football team. And everything changed.

“I ENJOYED FLYING, BUT I LOVED Singleton said. “It was a little different from what I intended to do. I started out all my Academy years and even after graduation, I was going to be that fighter pilot guy. I fell head over heels in love

‘Oh,

it would be kind of

When I got down there and was able to do it, and was a part of it, it kind of spoke to me. I felt led. That it was what the Good Lord had in store for me.

Singleton worked at Air Force from 2003-2010, coaching running backs and adding the title of run game coordinator his final four seasons. Each year, the Falcons won the conference rushing title and finished in the top 10 nationally. Gundy brought Singleton to OSU from Air Force in 2011,

And it offered perks, too.

As Singleton knows, there’s a lot to a military education that goes unknown or misunderstood. The demands are high, academically and physically. And there’s the post-graduation military commitment. But there are lifetime memories as well.

“I pursued that dream and was fortunate that some things went my way and I was able to give back to the Academy and coach while I was still active duty military, and also get hired on as a civilian when I separated from the Air Force.”

“THE AIR FORCE ACADEMY HAS THE CORE VALUES OF SERVICE BEFORE SELF, EXCELLENCE IN ALL WE DO, AND IT STARTS OUT WITH INTEGRITY FIRST,” HE SAID. “That’s one of the things I started to internalize. Probably not as much while I was there, but after I graduated and realized if I could lead my family and live my life with those core values, if I could live through those things, I could probably be a successful person, be a good person and a good citizen as well.

“Those things, that you feel like are being beat into your head when you’re a cadet, to this day they are still codes that come up in my mind and are still fitting for what I do now in coaching football and dealing with young people.”

BLENDING ORANGE

School wasn’t going so good for Joe Nelson in 1965.

He was a freshman at Oklahoma State; and he was bright. But he was dragged down by the usual distractions for a kid getting his first taste of independence. So facing school probation at a time when the military draft was in force, Nelson figured he’d just enlist, signing on with the U.S. Navy.

It was no pleasure cruise, no shipping off for Hawaii or some other dream locale. Nelson was dropped directly into Vietnam as a Seabee — in the mobile construction battalion — operating heavy equipment. On the ground with Marines, evidence of the seriousness of their missions, Nelson and the other Seabees cleared brush and grounds as sites for gun pads and roads and bridges and other facilities.

“I DIDN’T REALIZE EXACTLY HOW MUCH DANGER I WAS IN AT TIMES,” NELSON SAID.

“I broke into a cold sweat, knowing — because I didn’t have any clue at the time — we could have been wiped out pretty easily. But they didn’t want to be detected, which is what saved our bacon, because they didn’t want to be seen on their way south.”

Nelson spent 18 months in Vietnam during his four-year commitment, before a discharge and a return to Oklahoma.

It was four years that changed him forever.

“I went over there immature, a chip on my shoulder,” Nelson said. “I hadn’t done so well in college; that was only because I didn’t apply myself. It changed my life for the good, for the most part. You learn to appreciate the sun coming up. It’s very meaningful to me, because we weren’t always sure we’d see the sun come up.”

“WHEN YOU LEARN THE VALUE OF LIFE, IT REALLY CHANGES YOU.”

school of hotel and restaurant administration and is now with the POSSE. His office offers reminders of his time in the Navy, most remarkably is his Pistol Pete piece of art, framed prominently on the wall.

“I TAKE PRIDE IN HAVING SERVED,” Nelson said. “And I am grateful to be a survivor. My father-in-law was a survivor of Pearl Harbor. He

He spent two tours in Vietnam, with the first working six miles from the DMZ (demilitarized zone) — the demarcation line separating North Vietnamese territory and South Vietnamese territory. Nelson sensed danger and trouble, as he and four other Seabees and 12 Marines operated from a small compound surrounded by 15 rows of wire. But it wasn’t until years later, when he was back in the U.S. watching a PBS documentary on the conflict that he discovered how close he and his men might have been to death.

There was fallout, too, from the two tours. Nelson battled nightmares for more than 20 years, some of them intense.

Still, he came home a decorated soldier, most proud for receiving the Navy Expert Rifleman Medal and the Combat Action Ribbon, given to those who actively engage in ground combat. He returned to school, too, first at Central State University (now the University of Central Oklahoma). And it went much better.

knowing what it meant to him. And those I served with, I was proud to serve with them. So it means a lot to me.”

Veteran’s Day means a lot to Nelson, too. And if he happens to be working on a Veteran’s Day, you’ll likely see him in an old stars and stripes tie, bought in the days following his return home and brought out for special occasions.

WITH RED, WHITE AND BLUE

“In the documentary, it was noted that the North Vietnamese army was making a push to go south,” Nelson said. “THEY CAME WITHIN PROBABLY A COUPLE MILES OF WHERE WE WERE AND COULD HAVE OVERRUN US IF THEY WANTED, BECAUSE THERE WERE THOUSANDS OF THEM.”

“The courses I flunked before, I set the curve,” Nelson said. “Even with the bad grades I carried from my first year, I ended up with over a 3-point grade average overall. So I had become an honor student.”

Nelson eventually made his way back to OSU, moving with his wife to Stillwater in 1992. He’s worked in university accounting and in the athletic department business office as an accountant, spent time in the

“I’ve had it ever since,” Nelson said. “I had to cut it down, because it was really wide. But I wear it on election days and things like that.

If I’m working on Veteran’s Day, I’ll sport that tie.”

“EVERYBODY AROUND HERE KNOWS THAT I BLEED ORANGE. BUT MY HEART IS RED, WHITE AND BLUE.”

The Father Figure Cowgirlof Basketball

The Father Figure Cowgirlof Basketball

STORY BY RYAN CAMERON

One simple chore on a bus trip to Kansas speaks volumes about what kind of man Oklahoma State has in charge of its women’s basketball program.

During a stop at a convenience store somewhere along the route, all but a few people exited the bus to stretch their legs and grab a snack. First-year head coach Jim Littell opted instead to empty the overflowing trash can.

When one of the remaining members of the travel party informed him he was the head coach now and had people at the ready to take care of such tasks, Littell quickly responded, “YOU WILL NEVER GET THE JUCO OUT OF ME,” and proceeded to finish the job.

What exactly is the “juco” in Littell?

It is the work ethic and principles responsible for a 14-year stretch at Seward

County (Kan.) Community College (junior college, i.e. juco) that generated numbers normally reserved for fantasy leagues. During that span, his squads carved out a 418-61 record and produced a 135-game home winning streak and a 38-0 campaign that resulted in a national title in 2002.

“I have always had the theory that we are going to out-work people and we

are going to out-think people and we are going to out-tough people. We are going to understand the game and we are going to work extremely hard. Practices are going to make games seem easy. We will be very well prepared and give our kids every opportunity we can for them to succeed,” Littell said.

Littell’s trademark throughout his career has been winning with players cut from his same cloth, maybe a bit short on talent, but passionate about the game.

“I have had a lot of good players, but what I think has been neat has been that I have coached a lot of kids that I think have been overachievers; they had some limitations but turned out to be really good players because of their character and their heart,” Littell said.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

Growing up, Littell’s favorite sport was determined by the calendar.

“I loved every sport. I was one of those that my favorite sport was the season that I was in. I loved football, I loved basketball, and really my first passion was probably baseball,” Littell said.

In the end, basketball proved to be the sport of choice for Littell before a knee injury curtailed his playing career at Southwestern College in Winfield, Kan.

“I really enjoyed the game, but I wasn’t very good. There is that old song ‘Glory Days’ about how you got better after you have been out. I look at it and in my mind I still wasn’t very good. It didn’t take me long to figure out that if I wanted to stay in athletics, it was going to be taking the coaching route.”

Littell didn’t have to look far for that blueprint. Both parents worked in the profession.

“My dad and mom went back to college after they were 40 and became coaches. I was in a family of coaches. I just wanted to ensure that I could go on and be around sports the rest of my life,” Littell said.

With the expense of attending a private school proving to be a financial burden, Littell expedited the graduation process, taking 20 hours in one summer and finding a bit of good fortune to secure his first coaching gig at the age of 20.

“I graduated late in the summer and a coaching job opened late in the summer. I went to Burlingame, Kan., in 1977, and I was assistant high school football coach, seventh grade girls volleyball coach and eighth grade girls volleyball coach. I was seventh grade girls basketball, eighth grade girls basketball, high school boys assistant, head boys track and junior high girls track coach, drove the bus, made $10,500 and thought I was the richest guy in the world,” Littell said.

To say Littell is “green” was an understatement.

Ironically, Littell had little desire to coach the girls’ game and only did so when his attempt to break through on the boys’ side failed.

“I applied for the men’s job at a small high school, Oxford High School in Kansas. I kept going back and they finally just said we aren’t going to hire you for the men’s job, but the women’s job is open and we will hire you for that if you want it,” Littell said.

“I remember telling them, I was a men’s coach and I didn’t want to coach girls. I kind of stuck with that for a while. They kept coming back at me, and I finally took it.”

Little did he know about the dire situation he was about to inherit. IT WAS THE FIRST REBUILD IN WHAT WOULD BECOME THE THEME OF HIS COACHING CAREER.

“I kept asking them before I took the job about how many games they had won last year. They said, ‘Well, they didn’t win many games, but they have a lot of good, young kids coming.’ I kept asking how many games they had won and they never did tell me,” Littell said.

It was with good reason the school held its cards close to the vest.

“I took the job and then they told me they had won two games in the previous eight years,” Littell explained.

The boys’ program’s loss would quickly become the girls’ gain.

“That year, when we were 4-0 at Christmas, I think I was the winningest coach in Oxford High School history,” Littell said with his patented sense of humor.

During a five-year stint at Oxford, Littell amassed a 94-14 record and did the unthinkable for a once downtrodden program, delivering a state championship in 1981.

“It was a really neat deal. A lot of the kids hadn’t had much success going through and it was a lot of fun for the community as well,” Littell said.

Two years after his state title run, Littell made the move to the collegiate level for the first time. BILL CARTER, a wellrespected coach in the state, brought him aboard at Friends University in 1983 and the next stop on Littell’s rebuilding tour once again produced favorable results.

“They had been down a little bit when I took that job over. I really loved my time at Friends (located in Wichita) because the kids were there for the right reasons. A lot of them would spend massive amounts of money to go there because it was a private

“THE FIRST VOLLEYBALL GAMES IN MY LIFE I HAD SEEN I COACHED, SO THAT TELLS YOU THE EXPERTISE I HAD.”

“He makes you feel like whatever is going on with you is more important than anything that is going on with him.”

i

TAYLOR HARDEMAN

school, and they really enjoyed playing the game,” Littell said.

Like Oxford, Littell quickly righted the ship and brought positive results to a program in need, producing two 20-win campaigns as well as a pair of conference championships.

Littell followed Carter for a quick foray into southwestern Oklahoma and Cameron University.

“I went to Cameron for a year with Coach Carter and he decided to move late

Plains, Kan., squad posted a 21-3 mark before opportunity once again presented itself at the collegiate level.

A relationship with the men’s head coach at Seward County landed Littell an interview for the women’s head coaching position. Once hired, he found himself charged with the familiar task of reviving yet another program down on its luck. The Lady Saints had strung together seven consecutive losing seasons, including a single-digit win total the year before his arrival.

“I remember taking it late, and it was a tough first year. We went 14-16 and I remember everybody commenting on how good we were. I thought, ‘You guys are watching a different game than I am because we aren’t very good,’” Littell recalled.

“We had a great recruiting class, and we went from 14 to 28 wins the next year and then it just started steamrolling from there.”

“I guess we found a lot of kids that were diamonds in the rough that people didn’t know about. They really came in and bought into what we wanted to do and just got better. We spent a lot of time recruiting kids that were good teammates from winning programs and were really good chemistry kids as well.”

After giving the folks in Liberal, Kan. a dose of success, the expectation level rose quickly and Littell and Co. did not disappoint, winning 87 percent of the time.

“It was expected that we would win after the first couple of years. If you didn’t win 30 you were having a bad year,” said the 2009 National Junior College Athletic Association Hall of Fame inductee.

While building a dynasty in a community boasting a population just north of 20,000, Littell waited patiently for his chance at the Division I level. However, he was passed over by several schools, including Oklahoma State.

in the year. I was basically looking for a job. They told me I could take the women’s job there, but they really hadn’t made much of a commitment to the program.”

Not finding what he wanted in Lawton, Littell returned to the high school level for one season. Not surprisingly, his Garden

SCCC reeled off 13 consecutive 20-win seasons, surpassed the 30-win total seven times and never lost more than seven games in a season after that first year under Littell. His formula for success was simple. Find players that had flown under the radar, were not afraid to work hard and were willing to buy into the system.

“It was before AAU had developed and there were a lot of kids that just hadn’t been seen and got overlooked. We went to places like Beaver, Okla., and got people like Megan Gregg that ended up being a Cowgirl,” Littell said.

“I had interviewed some other places and got what I thought were some courtesy interviews. I just don’t know how much people respected what junior college coaches did at that time. I don’t know if they thought the success we had there would translate to success in Division I. That was the stigma we had to overcome. I had some opportunities, but I wasn’t going to go with anyone I didn’t trust.”

That trust to leave the powerhouse he had constructed came in the form of an old friend by the name of Kurt Budke. The man Littell had called a friend since the mid-80s delivered on a deal the two had made years before.

“I was the head coach at Friends and he was an assistant at Friends,” Littell said. “We lived together, shared a house and we made a pact at that point that whomever made it first would take the other one. Obviously, he had great success at Trinity Valley, which led to Louisiana Tech and the success he had a Louisiana Tech led to here. We kept that pact and got back together in 2005.”

PHOTO / GARY LAWSON

The two friends reunited in Stillwater with Budke arriving as OSU’s head coach and tabbing Littell as his right-hand man to help redirect a program that produced a total of 23 wins over the previous three seasons.

Sound familiar?

Success was not immediate as year one resulted in a 6-22 mark with a winless conference season and a 17-game losing streak to close the year, providing a wakeup call of sorts for both.

“I think we were both so accustomed to winning that we took it for granted. I don’t think either one of us had any concept of how bad the situation was or how much work it was going to take to change the program around,” Littell said.

“It was a very long year — especially after having all of the success that Coach Budke and I had experienced at different levels. There were a few games we were in, but there were a lot more games that we were down by 30 in the first half. We did the best that we could to coach the kids that we had, but we were also going

out and recruiting pretty hard during that time frame.”

The fruits of their labors did not take long to pay off. The extensive recruiting efforts signaled the arrival of building blocks in dynamic freshman Andrea Riley and junior college workhorse Danielle Green.

What was the nation’s largest turnaround as the Cowgirls posted a 20-11 mark and REACHED THE NCAA TOURNAMENT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 11 YEARS in year two of the Budke-Littell partnership. In 2008, just two years removed from a winless Big 12 season, OSU matched the school record with 27 wins and reached the NCAA Sweet 16 for the first time since 1991.

The program was primed to make another NCAA run during the 2011-12 season with a talented young nucleus of players in Tiffany Bias, Toni Young and Liz Donohoe. However, just one game into the season tragedy struck the program with Budke and assistant coach Miranda Serna perishing in a plane crash. Littell was thrust into a shocking situation.

What ensued may very well have been the best coaching job in a career filled with eye-popping superlatives. While dealing with the loss of his close friend, Littell rallied his squad, bringing the Cowgirls to the brink of a berth in the NCAA Tournament.

Disappointed after not seeing its dance ticket punched, his squad rallied one last time and, with an outpouring of support from the community, captured the WNIT championship.

“I WAS EXTREMELY PROUD OF THE TEAM AND HOW RESILIENT THEY WERE,” he said. “It felt like it was a team that was playing with purpose. They were on a mission. We were really young and everything we had gone through as a team, it would have been pretty easy to just say, ‘You know what, we will try it again next year.’ The way the kids were and how good they were to work with and how they endured everything. I was and am still extremely proud of them.”

In addition to cutting down the nets, multiple silver linings emerged from an unthinkable situation.

“I was a little upset at first that we were left out of the NCAA Tournament, but in hindsight I look back and it was the best thing that could have ever happened. It allowed us to practice a month longer with a young team. We played six games at home and I really believe we built some of our fan base during the WNIT,” Littell said.

The job of a coach is to instruct his team and help them improve, but that season produced a teaching moment for Littell.

“I started trying to have more balance in my life,” he said. “I need to put basketball, at times, in a secondary position to my family and other things. That year taught me to have balance and maybe mellowed me a little bit and made me more compassionate to people. Some people would say it made me softer.”

That compassionate side is something former Cowgirl Megan Byford, who was a member of OSU’s 2008 Sweet 16 squad, says was there all along.

“He is such a grounded person. What makes me laugh is people think he is mean and a scary person, but he is a total opposite of that,” she said. “He is one of the funniest people I know. He always makes sure the people around him are taken care of. He is not caught up in it being all about him and what is going on with him. He wants to make sure everybody is ok. That is just how he is.”

After leading the Cowgirls to that WNIT title, Littell has continued pushing the program toward loftier goals. With him

PHOTO / BRUCE WATERFIELD

at the helm, the program has produced the most successful three-year stretch in its history. OF COURSE, HE IS NOT SATISFIED.

“We have talked about raising the bar ever since we have been here. The next progression after winning the WNIT was the NCAA Tournament. We did that. Then we wanted to win a game. We all felt like we should have won the game at Duke (in the 2013 NCAA Tournament) and I think there was a disappointment from our coaches and players. We learned that year that when you go on the road you have to overcome some obstacles and you have to be pretty good to go into an environment like that. That was another chance for us to grow and take the next step. I really believe being that close, our players and our coaches became that much more determined.”

That determination produced a satisfying NCAA Tournament in 2014. A win over Florida Gulf Coast and a second-round triumph over home-standing Purdue meant a return to the Sweet 16 — just the third in OSU history.

His work has not gone unnoticed, drawing praise from numerous peers, including the program’s fiercest rival.

“He’s an unbelievable basketball coach. I recruited Jamie Talbert from him back in the day when he was at Seward County, and he was an unbelievable coach there. Nobody wanted to play Seward County. He’s a great tactician. He does a great job with strategy, and his kids play really hard for him, and that’s a pretty lethal combination,” OKLAHOMA HEAD COACH SHERRI COALE told The Oklahoman last spring.

Littell has already left his stamp on the program in his short time at the helm, but you won’t catch him stopping to admire his work.

“There is a lot more to do. In this league you can’t bask in your glory and you can’t live on what you did yesterday because this league can humble you in a hurry. I don’t know if you ever have time to really appreciate the accomplishments you had. It is a never-ending challenge to try to stay on

top or get to the top. We haven’t gotten where we want to be yet, and that is what we are still striving for,” Littell said.

When not roaming the sidelines, preparing for the next game or searching for the program’s next star, it is likely you will find Littell serving as lead cheerleader. He and his wife, Barb, have three children.

Whether it’s baseball with his sons JERAME, now a sophomore for the UT Arlington squad, or JON, a freshman for Josh Holliday’s Cowboy nine, or daughter, JACI, a gifted athlete in her own right who may very well wind up playing for her father one day, Littell fills the role of proud father as well as any.

“I AM PROUD OF ALL OF MY KIDS. WHEN YOU HAVE OTHER COACHES SAY THEY CAN TELL THEY ARE COACHES’ KIDS I TAKE THAT AS A COMPLIMENT. They have done well in the classroom. They have taken care of their business. They are respectful to coaches and teammates and have worked awfully hard to be good players,” Littell said.

“I probably spend too much time bragging on my kids, but I am a proud dad. It has been a lot of fun. It was a special day this spring when Jon’s group (Stillwater High School) won the 6A baseball state championship and Jerame hits a walkoff homer to put his team in the (junior college) world series. Those are moments that make a dad proud.”

With all he has accomplished in the game, ask Littell what he would like his legacy to be and his answer is simple.

“I want the legacy of being a good husband and dad. That is important to me to be a good dad and a good husband,” Littell said.

That father-figure presence is not limited to his family, but permeates throughout his team.

“He is very father-like. He treats you like you are one of his kids. No matter what is going on with his life, he didn’t really bring that to work. He makes you feel like whatever is going on with you is more important than anything that is going on with him,” said former Cowgirl Taylor Hardeman, who was part of the 0-16 to Sweet 16 turnaround.

“I was lucky that I got to play for him. He is very intense and expects a lot out of you. As a player, you wanted to do your best for him.”

Look no further than Byford, now an assistant coach at Tulsa, to see those “juco” principles in full effect.

“My whole coaching philosophy and style is based on what I learned from him. I am teaching my kids the same things that he taught me because they work. It isn’t easy, but it is the tried and true way of getting it done.”

For Littell, the words of his former players are worth far more than a jam-packed trophy case.

“One thing that is very special to me now is players from 10-15 years ago calling me and telling me about their successes and what they are doing. It is about a lot more than the wins and losses. It is about the relationships. I want part of my legacy to be that I have helped impact some young people’s lives.”

A Rising Star Earns Her Stripes

STORY BY TAYLOR MILLER

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

IN MAY, OSU’S VIKTORIYA LUSHKOVA BECAME ONE OF THE YOUNGEST FEMALES IN THE COUNTRY TO

ACHIEVE ALL-AMERICA STATUS when she earned the award at the age of 17. Along the way she became Oklahoma State’s 13th All-American in women’s tennis and its first since 1991.

A native of Simferopol, Ukraine, Lushkova started playing tennis at six. She said she used it as a way to stay active. Before she turned eight, she was staying “active” six times a week.

She continued to dedicate herself for years, but admitted that there was never a point when she decided that tennis would be her future.

“It was kind of just a go-with-the-flow thing. My parents thought I should go with it,” she said. “So many times I was injured and decided to stop, but then I found some motivation in the fact that I had already practiced for that long so I kept playing.”

Her on-court success caught the eye of coaches from more than 30 American and British universities. One of the interested parties was Oklahoma State women’s tennis coach Chris Young.

Lushkova decided to attend OSU after talking with a friend and former Cowboy tennis player, VLAD BONDARENKO, who encouraged her to bring her talents to Oklahoma.

The new Cowgirl arrived in Stillwater in December of 2013. Despite having traveled to the United States a few times before, she faced some difficulties with a slight language barrier and adjusting to the American lifestyle.

“I knew English because I studied it in school, but I wasn’t that great. Sometimes I couldn’t understand what people wanted from me so I felt really weird. As time went on, it got better,” she said. “The people’s mentality here is different than back home. The lifestyle is different. The food here is completely different and not even close to what I’m used to.”

Not long after Lushkova arrived in Stillwater, her country was thrown into turmoil with the uneasiness between Ukraine and Russia.

“Because of all the changes that are going in Ukraine, it is sometimes difficult to communicate with my family,” she said. “During the spring semester, the situation back home distracted me because I was worried if everyone was safe. But now I guess I’m used to it. I can’t change anything because I am so far away. It’s getting better there. Not great, but better. Not dangerous, but not safe.”

Even though she was uncomfortable in some aspects, she was as comfortable as ever on the tennis court. The freshman began playing at the No. 2 spot for the Cowgirls. She suffered an early loss to No. 25 Maho Kowase of Georgia at the Hawaii Pacific Duals, but stormed back with a 15-match unbeaten streak that lasted two months.

A MONTH INTO HER COLLEGIATE CAREER, SHE WAS BUMPED UP TO THE NO. 1 SPOT IN THE OSU LINEUP. In her first match at the top position, she knocked off No. 79 Yang Pang of Arkansas in straight sets, 6-1, 6-4. Perhaps Lushkova’s most impactful

win came against in-state rival and No. 14 Oklahoma on March 9 in Stillwater. There was a full house at the Michael and Anne Greenwood Tennis Center and the Bedlam match was featured nationally as a part of College Match Day by the United States Tennis Association.

Lushkova faced OU senior Whitney Ritchie on court one. The Cowgirl dropped the first set, winning only one game. The freshman battled back for a 6-2 secondset victory, forcing a third and deciding set. The match was extended to a seven-point tiebreaker after being deadlocked through 12 games. The two exchanged points early in the tiebreaker, but it was Lushkova who pulled away for the win, taking four of the last five points. The win sealed the upset-victory for the No. 39 Cowgirls.

The fresh-faced star’s performance in her first semester didn’t seem to shock Young.

“She came in really confident and she believed that she was one of the better players in the nation. Her expectations and just the way that she went about everything day-to-day was a reflection of her attitude and the confidence she had in her ability,” he said. “A lot times that’s something that’s developed in players as they get older and they start to understand. She came in with a lot of experience and had a good, strong attitude with confidence from the beginning.

“She expects to win no matter what the score is or no matter what situation she is facing. She knows she has the ability to win, and she doesn’t fear anybody. That kind of confidence is important.”

That confidence and skill earned Lushkova 19 wins as a freshman, including seven over ranked opponents. When the dust had settled on her first season in Stillwater, Lushkova had reached several milestones. She was named the Big 12 freshman of the year and the ITA central region rookie of the year. She was also All-Big 12 in singles and doubles.

“THAT WAS SOMETHING I WILL NEVER FORGET,” Lushkova said. “I’ve never felt that nervous going into a match in my whole life, even when I played Grand Slams. I feel like I had so much pressure to play well because we were going against OU and we had to beat them. The motivation was how I found the weapons to beat her.”

LUSHKOVA CRACKED THE TOP 100 IN RANKINGS THE FOLLOWING WEEK, MOVING UP 25 SPOTS TO NO. 83. She continued to impress as the 2014 season went on and spent seven-straight weeks in the Intercollegiate Tennis Association’s singles rankings, with her highest ranking coming on April 22, when she was 44th.

In May, the freshman earned a bid to the NCAA singles championships, marking the first time in 12 years a Cowgirl competed in the event. She entered the tournament ranked No. 52 and knocked off 42nd-ranked Laura Antonana Iriarte of San Diego State in the first round.

The win pitted her against No. 14 Olivia Janowicz of Florida in the round of 32. Lushkova fought her way to a 7-5, 7-5 win to clinch All-America status.

“AFTER I WON THAT MATCH, I WAS LIKE, ‘HEY, I’M AN ALL-AMERICAN.’”

“And then I was asking coach what that meant. I’d never heard of that, but I figured it was probably something like what we have back in Ukraine when you get an award for being one of the best players in the country,” Lushkova said. “Now, I get it. Everyone really respects that honor. I have to work even harder to get it this year. To

“She expects to win no matter what the score is.”

— CHRIS YOUNG

me, it means that I did a really good job to achieve that, and it should reflect well on the school that I did it.”

Lushkova advanced to the round of 16, where she fell to No. 27 Ester Goldfield of Duke, 6-4, 6-3, ending a phenomenal season for the newcomer. Proud of her accomplishments in her first semester, she said she credits her success to early motivation she carried into the season.

“I was so motivated from the beginning,” she said. “I wanted to be Big 12 player of the year or freshman of the year. I actually hate not getting rewarded when I’m working really hard. If I have goals, I can push through everything. I decided to not give up even though it was hard balancing school and practices. I think that helped me a lot.”

During the 2014 season, the Cowgirl tennis team, full of fresh talent, had one of its best campaigns in recent years with Lushkova leading the way.

She has already seen success in 20142015 as she finished the fall season as the ITA Central Region singles champion and won the doubles title with partner Kelsey Laurente. She advanced to the USTA/ITA National Indoor Intercollegiate Championships, where she made it to the singles quarterfinals and the doubles semifinals.

“I think that she has brought a confident attitude to the team,” Young said. “As our program is growing, we have certain benchmarks involved, and she expects to be the best. She’s not going to settle for anything less than that. I think that she portrayed that confidence to the team. I think the team fed off of that last season, and they also gained the confidence that they could play with anybody.”

Lushkova helped the Cowgirls to their second straight runner-up finish in Big 12 play. The league tournament was followed by a third-straight appearance in the NCAA Tournament. A firstround win over South Florida was followed a tightly-contested loss to No. 9 Florida.

“That match was just showing us that we have to work harder and harder and we can compete against good teams,” Lushkova said. “We can actually beat those teams, and we just have to step up more and be more confident. We can’t be scared of the name of the school because you never know who is playing on the other side of the court. We just have to play our game. We can’t give up on easy points, and we have to continue to work hard and try our best. As soon as we do that, we can be great.”

Lushkova, of course, has high hopes for the Cowgirls this year.

“We have some really good players this year,” she said. “I think the team is working harder now. We’re better on the court and we’re more fit. I think those first (fall) tournaments showed that we can compete against really good teams like Duke, North Carolina and Florida. I truly believe that we can get the chance to host some NCAA matches in Stillwater. I think it will be easier for us to play the first couple of rounds here and get us to the Sweet 16. I think that’s a goal we can reach this year.”

As far as her personal goals go, the sophomore is ranked No. 26 in the preseason poll and feels she needs to continue to compete with confidence and be team oriented.

“I already have knowledge of college tennis and how it works,” Lushkova said. “I can’t be afraid of opponents or what school I am playing. I just have to go out there and do my job. I need to stay confident and work toward my goals. I think the most important thing for me this year is to play for my team. Last semester I didn’t have a lot of experience on how to play for a team, but now I know what I need to do. I just have to work harder to be a better team player.

THAT’S HOW TEAMS REACH THEIR GOALS. THEY PLAY FOR EACH OTHER.”

“We can be great.”

A big part of how he got there can be traced back to Stillwater, Oklahoma.

Before he ever led one of Major League Baseball’s most storied franchises to a WORLD SERIES TITLE, Farrell helped pioneer a college baseball dynasty at Oklahoma State.

Red Dirt From

STORY BY WADE McWHORTER

And while he may not have known or entirely understood it at the time, Farrell’s four years in a Cowboy uniform, under the tutelage of OSU’s hall of fame head coach Gary Ward, were integral in Farrell hoisting The Commissioner’s Trophy on the field at Fenway Park in 2013.

“The years that you spend in college, in my opinion, are the years that put the final imprint on who you’re going to become as an adult,” Farrell said. “Fortunately, I was exposed to (Coach Ward) and his methods. In the fall, I can remember we would go up into a classroom in Gallagher Hall, and we would go through hours of listening to motivational tapes and him speaking on goal setting and all the things entailed that create discipline.

“(WARD) WAS DEMANDING, HE WAS DISCIPLINED, HE WAS THE FIRST EXPOSURE I GOT TO GOAL SETTING AND ALL THAT WAS ENTAILED WITH THAT, AND HE MADE A HUGE IMPACT ON ME AS A PERSON.

“There’s no question that helped form who I became as an adult.”

Over three decades prior to becoming a World Series champion with the Boston Red Sox, Farrell was like many high school baseball stars, just trying to figure out where he was going to play college ball. The right-handed pitcher also had the option of professional baseball having been a ninth-round draft pick of the Oakland A’s in the 1980.

John Farrell has reached the pinnacle of baseball.

One trip to Stillwater and a weekend with Ward and OSU assistant coach Tom Holliday would answer that question for the Monmouth Beach, N.J., native. The Cowboy coaching duo, just over three years into building a college baseball dynasty, had Farrell hooked.

“It was their pursuit of me,” said Farrell when asked what appealed to him about the OSU program. “Both (Ward) and Coach Holliday were active in their recruiting, and it came down to identifying those who you were going to play for. They were a clearcut choice over others that showed interest.

“Their persistence and Coach Ward’s vision of what he had in mind for the program, the facility, the level of play — and all that came to fruition as it turned out.”

DID IT EVER.

Farrell pitched four seasons for the Cowboys, from 1981-84, and each of those ended with A TRIP TO OMAHA AND THE COLLEGE WORLD SERIES. The ’81 club marked the first of OSU’s 10 CWS teams under Ward and began a streak of seven-straight years the Pokes advanced to Omaha, which still stands as an NCAA record.

“Honestly, in high school I didn’t know what the College World Series was about so my exposure to college baseball was minimal,” Farrell said. “Once I arrived in Stillwater, it became clear what our goal was, and to contribute to that and be a part of it was an incredible experience.”

Farrell’s success on the mound mirrored the Cowboys’ winning ways.

IN 52 APPEARANCES IN AN OSU UNIFORM, FARRELL WAS 20-6 WITH 11 COMPLETE GAMES, 168 STRIKEOUTS AND A PROGRAM-RECORD SIX SHUTOUTS.

Rob Walton, now OSU’s pitching coach, was a teammate and roommate of Farrell’s during his days with the Cowboys, and he remembers Farrell as an exemplary presence on the mound and in the clubhouse.

“As a player, he was always prepared and always disciplined in how he went about his business,” Walton said. “The first year I was here, he was in the transition of being a power guy and understanding the pitchability of it. The second year, he really started to hone in on his skills and put it together.

“And John was a guy that was a great teammate because he was a guy that would take a younger player like me under his wing and say, ‘This is how it’s done.’ He showed you the ropes, told you this is how you do things and prepare for your next level of baseball. He was always willing to give you some information and try to help you along.”

to Red Sox

A big part of how he got there can be traced back to Stillwater, Oklahoma.

Farrell said that type of tireless preparation was necessary on OSU teams loaded with some of the top talent in college baseball.

“Playing with so many players that were so talented was an eye-opening experience for me,” Farrell said. “Coming from a very small beach town in New Jersey and coming to OSU where players from all over the country were brought in, it was eye opening the level of talent that was in our own program, let alone who we were competing against.

“That was a challenge in its own right, just positioning yourself as a pitcher to get innings.”

And while those OSU teams made a name for themselves with eye-popping offensive numbers, the Cowboy pitching staffs weren’t too shabby either.

“They were deep, they were talented — whether it was Mike Henneman, Dennis Livingston, Gary Kanwisher, Mike Trapasso, Mitch Coplon, there were a number of guys that went on to pitch in pro ball,” Farrell said. “Just earning a spot on the pitching staff, either as a starter or just getting innings, you had to perform to a pretty high level just to compete with those inside the program.

“And as I’ve come to realize, competition within is one of the more healthy things you can be involved with. It drives you to perform and improve, and that was certainly the case while I was there.”

Following a senior season that saw him go 12-2 with a 3.16 ERA, eight complete games and five shutouts — numbers that helped OSU win a school-record 61 games and finish third at the 1984 College World Series — Farrell once again had his name called in the MLB draft, this time as a second-round pick of the Cleveland Indians.

Three years later, he made his big league debut. One of the highlights of his eightyear Major League Baseball career came during that 1987 season when, in just his second-career start, he held PAUL MOLITOR hitless in four at-bats to end the Hall of Famer’s 39-game hitting streak.

“Because of (Molitor’s) success and the attention he was receiving around the country, to be involved in stopping it was something you don’t think you’re going to be a part of, but fortunately it unfolded that way,” Farrell said.

IN 1988, FARRELL WON A CAREER-HIGH 14 GAMES; in 1989, he tossed seven complete games and two shutouts, racked up a career-best 132 strikeouts and had another brush with history.

That moment came in May in Cleveland when Farrell carried a no-hitter into the ninth inning against the Kansas City Royals before giving up a single to KEVIN SEITZER.

“You recognize (a no-hitter is) happening probably when you get through the fifth inning, but then with each successive inning following, you felt a sense of something getting closer by the out,” Farrell said. “And I can remember going out for the ninth inning and (teammate) BUD BLACK giving me kind of a look where there were no words that needed to be spoken, and yet everyone knows what is taking place.

“Unfortunately, Kevin Seitzer broke it up with a base hit to right field.”

Following 36 wins and eight major league seasons, Farrell retired at the AllStar break in 1996.

step down as OSU’s head coach.

“It looked like Coach (Tom) Holliday was going to take over, and I approached Tom and said, ‘Hey, if you’re looking for a pitching coach, I would certainly be interested,’” Farrell said. “I knew I wanted to stay in the game and yet really didn’t have an exact idea of what I wanted to commit to.

“As I look back, getting into coaching was probably the most fortunate and best thing I could have ever asked for. You had to learn how to coach, you had to learn how to scout, you had to learn how to organize, you had to mentor young men — you wore a bunch of different hats. So it was a great position to come into after finishing a playing career.”

One of those Cowboys that Farrell helped mentor was current OSU head coach Josh Holliday, who starred for the Pokes during Farrell’s time as an assistant coach.

“(Farrell) brought tremendous background and credibility as a player, and it was especially cool having him as a coach here at Oklahoma State since he played here as well,” Holliday said. “He had a

Soon thereafter, his baseball career took an unexpected path — but one that once again crossed in Stillwater.

With him and his family still living in Cleveland, Farrell enrolled at OSU for the 1996 fall semester, making the commute from Cleveland to Oklahoma City to Stillwater every weekend to pursue the 22 credit hours he needed to earn his degree.

While studying for that degree in business management, Farrell heard opportunity knocking when Ward announced after Thanksgiving that he was going to

lot to offer all of us as players. As I got to know him, playing for him and working with him, he’s just a great person, a great dad, a great husband, all the things that when you get to know someone you start to appreciate them for.

“John is just a smart person in general — he’d be good at anything he chose to do — and everything that he does, he does with a tremendous amount of passion. He knows the game from multiple angles, whether it be the pitching side and the mental side of the game that he learned as a player himself or the other

“He’d be good at anything he chose to do.” — JOSH HOLLIDAY

elements of the game that he picked up through observation and being a student of the game. You always knew John knew the game, and he had great relationships and a huge amount of respect from everyone he knew.”

That respect meant the pros would once again be calling on Farrell, and after five seasons as an OSU assistant, he rejoined the Indians in 2001 as their Director of Player Development.

The next step for Farrell was a return to the field, and that came in 2007 when he joined Boston as its pitching coach, a move that paid immediate dividends when the Red Sox captured a World Series title that season.

Next stop — Toronto, where Farrell was named the manager of the Blue Jays in 2011. After his second year at the helm in Canada, he made history as the fourth manager in MLB history to be traded and returned to Boston as the Red Sox manager.

“I subscribe to the notion that if you stay focused with what you’re doing and do it to the best of your ability, the options or opportunities will arrive,” Farrell said. “It just so happens that things have unfolded in five-year cycles. I was at Oklahoma State for five years, I go to Cleveland as the farm director and director of player development for five years. That opportunity then opens the door to get back on the field as the pitching coach for Boston for almost five years. Then the next opportunity presented itself.

“I just knew I wanted to stay involved in the game. In what capacity, I was unclear.

“I would say my path isn’t a traditional one – crossing over from college to pro baseball, from the front office to the field. It gives me a set of circumstances that are unique compared to others in the game. It still comes down to how you manage people and how you deal with the individuals inside of a team concept.”

And once again, it turned out that Farrell was top notch at doing just that. In his first season as Boston’s manager,

he led an epic turnaround as a Red Sox team that had finished last in its division in 2012 was crowned the 2013 WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS.

“I was just part of a group of people that achieved it,” said Farrell, who was named SportingNews’2013 American League Manager of the Year. “It was a collection of players that fit what our vision was, and that was good teammates, quality guys, talented yes, but had track records of being very good teammates and were about accomplishing something as a group and not as individuals.

“Everyone receives their highlight video at the end of the year, and as I watched the film, I would find myself pausing it a number of times because the highlight only represents a portion of the story that is underlying. Holding up the trophy at the end of Game Six, there’s a 178-game journey to get to that point. That snapshot is just the tip of the iceberg to all that took place. From the phone calls that happened in the offseason prior to spring training, coming in new and trying to reconnect with the players that were here when I was here before to

iconic franchises in all of sport and the high expectations placed on him from the legion of Red Sox fans.

“It’s humbling, there’s no doubt,” Farrell said. “It’s an honor to wear this uniform and be trusted with the group that takes the field here. When you work in an environment that’s as passionate as Boston is, everything is magnified, good or bad. I became more aware of it and was definitely more equipped after being a pitching coach here. I had an understanding of the expectations and the magnitude of things. But still, there’s not going to be any external expectations that are greater than your own.

“Some people from afar might view it as daunting, but I think of it as being normal — that’s just the way it is.”

But no matter where Farrell’s baseball journey goes in the future, he’ll always hold a special fondness for his Cowboy roots.

“I spent nine years of my life in Stillwater, and it had a huge impact on me. And as I’m sure it is with a lot of people that come to OSU, it’s something that doesn’t leave you.”

every day in spring training to the whole season that unfolded and the challenges you were presented with.

“It’s an incredible feeling, and something that was great to share with a lot of people you respect and were glad to do it with them. That’s the thing that really stands out — the people that you share those moments with.”

Now a coaching veteran in Beantown, Farrell embraces his role as the leader of one of the most

“I was just part of a group of people that achieved it.”

the Honor Roll

When OSU announced its scholarship endowment initiative, the athletic program was last in the Big 12. Now, more than halfway through the 10-year program, OSU leads the conference. But we’re not finished yet.

OSU awards 229 full scholarships to student-athletes each year at a cost of $4.5 million. Each dollar freed up through endowed scholarships goes back into our programs. Better equipment. Better facilities. Better support. Each dollar has a direct impact on the lives of our student-athletes.

“Each scholarship we endow secures the future of OSU athletics and provides more opportunities for our student-athletes on and off the field,” says Mike Holder, Vice President for Athletic Programs and Director of Intercollegiate Athletics.

This is the list of all the generous supporters who have helped to provide a bright Orange future. They are our Honor Roll.

To learn more about scholarship opportunities and how you may contribute, please contact Larry Reece (405-744-2824) or Matt Grantham (405-744-5938).

“It has been amazing to see 315 donors step up to get us past the $58 million mark in commitments to the Leave A Legacy campaign.

The bottom line is OSU supporters get it … scholarships help our studentathletes today while strengthening our athletic budget forever.”

— LARRY REECE, SENIOR ASSOCIATE ATHLETIC DIRECTOR, DEVELOPMENT

BASEBALL 6.5

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

Dennis and Karen Wing (2)

Hal Tompkins

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Mike Bode and Preston Carrier

Jennifer and Steven Grigsby

Sally Sparks

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Bryant and Carla Coffman

David and Grace Helmer

Jill Rooker

FOOTBALL 32.0

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

Bob and Kay Norris

Bryant and Carla Coffman / The Merkel Foundation

David LeNorman

Dennis and Karen Wing (2)

Dr. Mark and Beth Brewer

Jack and Carol Corgan Football Scholarship

Jim Click

John and Gail Shaw

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Cindy Hughes

Donald Coplin

Doug Thompson

Ed and Helen Wallace

Greg Casillas

Ike and Marybeth Glass

Martha Seabolt

Sandy Lee

Dr. Scott Anthony

Ken and Jimi Davidson

Leslie Dunavant

Mike and Kristen Gundy

Mike and Robbie Holder

Ron Stewart

Ross and Billie McKnight

Sandy Lee

Tom and Sandra Wilson

Wray and Julie Valentine

Jim and Lynne Williams

John and Patti Brett

Mike and Judy Johnson

Sally Sparks

State Rangers

Tom Naugle

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Al and Martha Strecker

Arthur “Andy” Johnson, Jr.

Arthur Couch

Barry and Roxanne Pollard

Bill and Ruth Starr

Brad and Leah Gungoll

Brian K. Pauling

Bridgecreek Investment Management LLC

Bryan Close

David and Cindy Waits

David and Gina Dabney

Dr. Berno Ebbesson

Dr. Ron and Marilynn McAfee

Eddy and Deniece Ditzler

Flintco

Fred and Janice Gibson

GENERAL 1.25

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Terry and Martha Barker

AS OF 12/1/14

Fred and Karen Hall

Howard Thill

James and LaVerna Cobb

Jerry and Lynda Baker

Jerry and Rae Winchester

John P. Melot

John S. Clark

Ken and Leitner Greiner

Kent and Margo Dunbar

Paul and Mona Pitts

R. Kirk Whitman

Randal and Carol White

Roger and Laura Demaree

Shelli Osborn

Steve and Diane Tuttle

Tony and Finetta Banfield

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

David and Judy Powell

Kenneth and Susan Crouch

Sally Sparks

GRADUATE ATHLETE 0.75

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Bob and Joan Hert

Neal Seidle

Tom and Cheryl Hamilton

MEN’S BASKETBALL 20.75

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

A.J. and Susan Jacques

Brett and Amy Jameson

Calvin and Linda Anthony

Chuck and Kim Watson

David and Julie Ronck (1.25)

Dennis and Karen Wing (2)

Douglas and Nickie Burns

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Bill and Marsha Barnes

David and Julie Ronck

Dr. Mark and Susan Morrow

Jay and Connie Wiese

Griff and Mindi Jones

James and Mary Barnes

Jim Vallion

Ken and Jimi Davidson

Kent and Margo Dunbar

KimRay Inc.

Mitch Jones Memorial

Sally Sparks

Sandy Lee

Stan Clark

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Dr. Scott and Lynne Anthony

Gary and Sue Homsey

Holloman Family

Michael and Heather Grismore

Rick and Suzanne Maxwell

Robert and Sharon Keating

Steve and Suzie Crowder

Terry and Donna Tippens

MEN’S GOLF 4.25

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

David and Julie Ronck

Dennis and Karen Wing

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Stillwater National Bank

Jack and Carol Corgan Men’s Golf Scholarship

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Bob and Elizabeth Nickles

Garland and Penny Cupp

Richard and Joan Welborn

MEN’S TENNIS 0.25

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Tom and Cheryl Hamilton

MEN’S TRACK 0.75

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Dr. Mark and Susan Morrow

Susan Anderson

Ken and Leitner Greiner

SOFTBALL 0.25

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Tom and Cheryl Hamilton

WOMEN’S BASKETBALL 6.25

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

Brad and Margie Schultz

Ken and Jimi Davidson

Mike Bode and Preston Carrier

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Baloo and Maribeth Subramaniam

Don and Mary McCall

John and Caroline Linehan

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Bill and Roberta Armstrong

Bill and Sally Cunningham

Calvin and Linda Anthony

Donald Coplin

Jill Rooker

Jon and Nancy Patton

Richard and Linda Rodgers

WOMEN’S EQUESTRIAN 0.25

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

David and Gina Dabney

WOMEN’S GOLF 1.0

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

David and Julie Ronck

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Amy Weeks

Kent and Margo Dunbar

WOMEN’S TENNIS 0.25

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Jamie Maher

WRESTLING 10.25

FULL SCHOLARSHIP

A.J. and Susan Jacques

Bruce and Nancy Smith

Chuck and Kim Watson

Lon and Jane Winton

OSU Wrestling – White Jacket Club / Gallagher Endowed Wrestling Scholarship

OSU Wrestling – White Jacket Club / Myron Roderick Endowed Wrestling Scholarship

HALF SCHOLARSHIP

Mark and Lisa Snell

QUARTER SCHOLARSHIP

Danny and Dana Baze / Cory and Mindy Baze

John and Beverly Williams

R.K. Winters

OSU Wrestling – White Jacket Club / Ray Murphy Endowed Wrestling Scholarship

OSU Wrestling – White Jacket Club / Tommy Chesbro Endowed Wrestling Scholarship

The Cobb Family

Karsten Creek

STORY BY RYAN CAMERON

JUST AS ROME WAS NOT BUILT IN A DAY, THE SISTINE CHAPEL WAS NOT PAINTED OVERNIGHT AND THE PANAMA CANAL WAS MORE THAN A WEEKEND PROJECT, SO TOO WAS THE MASTERPIECE THAT IS THE HOME OF OKLAHOMA STATE’S GOLF PROGRAM, KARSTEN CREEK.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY GARY LAWSON

DEVELOPING A HIGHLY ACCLAIMED GOLF COURSE WAS A TRYING PROCESS REQUIRING EQUAL PARTS DETERMINATION, GENEROSITY AND IMAGINATION.

The end result of more than two decades of work was well worth it. Emerging from a dense plot of blackjack oak trees was a 7,400-YARD LAYOUT considered one of the premier facilities in college athletics — in any sport. While countless people played a crucial role in the creation of OSU’s crown jewel, three men were at the forefront of bringing Karsten Creek to life 20 years ago.

The Catalyst

A true visionary in the world of college golf, longtime OSU head coach Mike Holder identified early in his career the significant hurdles that had to be cleared in order to sustain a top-tier golf program in Stillwater. Population, weather and location were among the challenges that had to be addressed.

“IT IS HARD ENOUGH TO RECRUIT IN OKLAHOMA. There are three million people total in the state and you have that plus in Dallas or Houston or San Antonio alone. You are going to have to go out and compete and get them from other places. It is hard to get a kid to come out of the state

of Texas and go north where the weather is worse and the wind blows like a son of a gun. Stillwater is off the beaten path and there’s not much else to do,” Holder stated matter-of-factly.

“There are a lot of negatives associated with it, so I had to try to offset that with something no one else had.”

WHAT NO ONE ELSE HAD WAS A GOLF COURSE PRIMARILY USED BY AND CONTROLLED BY THE GOLF PROGRAM. Holder’s line of thinking was to provide an edge in the most vital element of any team — recruiting.

“It all comes back to recruiting. Your team is only as good as the talent you can attract. My first month on the job I shared an office with Chet Bryan, who was the baseball coach. He had some advice for me, and I was all ears. He said, ‘I have been watching you and if you think that you are going to win championships based strictly on your ability to coach up talent, you are not going to have a very long career. Go out and recruit a bunch of thoroughbreds, and then just get out of the way.’ That is pretty good advice.” Holder said.

With that in mind, it was not in his shared office space with Bryan that the idea of Karsten Creek emerged, but rather a basement office across campus.

“That first year I was coach in 1973 I was teaching management in the college of business. They had an office in the basement, and my office mate was one of our golfers. He had done a scale model of a golf course just on the south side of Lake Carl Blackwell. It had all of the relief, trees and everything,” Holder said.

Not accustomed to seeing the foliage, ravines and creeks the model displayed, Holder’s interest was piqued.

MIKE HOLDER WITH TOM FAZIO

MIKE HOLDER WITH KARSTEN SOLHEIM

“The next time I drove out on Highway 51, I made a point to glance over there north of the highway as I drove through the area. I had never really paid attention to it and thought it was beautiful and would be a great place for a golf course.”

Knowing his coach and the program’s founder, Labron Harris, had been responsible for building Lakeside Memorial Golf Course, Holder wanted to do that and more for his program.

“Coach Harris built Lakeside, and I thought maybe we could build a championship version of it someplace. That is where the idea came from. It just took me 20 to 21 years to find the place,” Holder said.

The location revealed itself in the late 1980s following a golf outing in Oklahoma City with OSU track and field coach Ralph Tate, athletics director Dick Young and Wiley T. McCollum. Holder had learned of a place across the highway from Lake Carl Blackwell known as Ham’s Lake, a locale of which, he learned on the ride home, Tate was very familiar.

A frequent fishing spot for Tate, he detoured the foursome’s return to Stillwater and arranged a boat tour of the lake, which confirmed Holder’s suspicion. He had discovered the future home of his golf sanctuary.

“As luck would have it, the university owned about three-fourths of the section and LAWRENCE HAM owned the northeast quarter. If we could buy that we could develop it and use the lot sales to help fund it. So that was the start. Dr. McCollum, who we played golf with that day, ended up being the guy that ended up buying the land for us,” Holder said.

The Namesake

The dream would have remained a fantasy without the means to bring it to life.

Enter Karsten Solheim.

The founder of Karsten Manufacturing, which produces PING golf equipment, found his company fledgling during the 1970s. Needing a jumpstart, Solheim sent GARY HART to Stillwater in 1976 to meet with Holder in an attempt to GET THE NATION’S PREMIER PROGRAM ONBOARD WITH HIS PRODUCT.

Unable to get his equipment in the hands of professionals, Solheim decided to target the tour’s future players while still at the collegiate level.

“He had the idea to go a step back and go get some good college players to use them and maybe get acceptance at the amateur level. Some of those good college players are going to play the tour, so maybe they will want to keep playing them,” Holder explained.

The sell was not easy, but by the early 1980s the Cowboys were PING-equipped, helping bring the program closer to the reality of having its own training ground via Holder’s relationship with Solheim.

“We were trying to build this golf course. I was talking to Gary Hart about it all the time. I thought it made sense that Karsten would give us some money. Finally, he mentioned that Karsten had never played Augusta National, so I thought maybe I could get him on because we had a friend, BILL WARREN, who was a member. Bill said sure and hosted him,” Holder said.

The trip to Augusta, coupled with a visit to the future site by Solheim, mixed in with Holder’s persistence, helped convince the course’s future namesake to get on board with the project.

“They weren’t having any luck getting PGA Tour players to use their clubs. They were ugly. I say ugly because they were so radically different from what everyone else was playing and from what everyone else was manufacturing,” Holder said.

“I can’t even remember how many years this had been going on. He called me one night, late, and said he was going to send some money for the golf course. I was thinking millions, but he said he would send half a million. It was more than I had, but it wasn’t what we needed. How do you sound excited and disappointed at the same time? He said he would send it in a week or so, and I waited and waited and waited,” Holder said.

THE WAIT WOULD PROVE TO BE MORE THAN WORTH IT when Holder received an afternoon phone call from his wife, Robbie, which would lead to a rollercoaster of emotions.

“She called and told me FedEx just brought an envelope from Karsten. I rushed home, ripped it open and looked at it. I thought, ‘I can’t believe this. The guy only sent $100,000. He was supposed to send $500,000. Now what am I going to do?’

“Robbie asked to see the check and quickly corrected her husband’s miscalculation and bluntly revealed the good news.

“She said, ‘No, you dummy, it’s a million.’ I wasn’t used to looking at those big numbers. I called him up to let him know I got the money and that he made a mistake on that check and sent a million instead of a half million,” Holder said.

TO WHICH SOLHEIM REPLIED, “THAT ISN’T A PROBLEM IS IT?”

The seven-figure check was not a problem, but a shot in the arm and just the first of several generous donations from Solheim and his family.

“They just kept giving a little bit more, and I still didn’t have enough to build it, and they kept giving a little bit more until we had enough to at least take a shot at it,” Holder said.

Having donated over $4 MILLION TOWARD THE PROJECT, it is clear why the course bears his name.

“We wouldn’t have the golf course if it weren’t for him. I think his generosity and his equipment led to a lot of our success. It was a great partnership because I think we helped them sell a lot of golf clubs,” Holder said.

The Architect

By the early 1980s, the project was picking up momentum, prompting Holder to call on Joe Walser, a former Cowboy who had a hand in the construction of courses such as Oak Tree and PGA West, to help select a course designer.

A man by the name of Tom Fazio had caught Walser’s attention. Expressing immediate interest, Fazio made multiple trips to Stillwater at his own expense, providing Holder with his initial blueprint.

“He went back with his team and designed a golf course and gave us the plans to go out and raise money to build the course. He never charged me for any of that,” Holder said.

With an estimated cost of $3 million, Holder went to work seeking 18 hole donors at $150,000 apiece to secure the funds to begin moving dirt. However, the process proved easier said than done and took longer than initially intended.

“It seemed like I would sell a hole or two and get a donor, then they would have a reversal of fortune and fall by the wayside. There were probably 25 or 26 people at one time that said they would do a hole. By the time 1991-92 rolled around, $2.7 million wasn’t going to build a golf course and that is where the Solheims came in and really got us over the hump,” Holder said.

In the midst of Holder’s fundraising efforts, Fazio had ascended to the world’s No. 1 architect and now commanded a heftier fee.

“We were persistent and had a dream” i

MIKE HOLDER

“I really didn’t think there was any way to get him to do this. We interviewed a few other architects thinking this was probably what we were going to have to do. I remember calling him and telling him I thought we might have a chance to do this now, but we didn’t have a big budget like a lot of these places that he was working for now,” Holder said.

Once again, Fazio’s generosity and affection for the project kept him in the fold. After asking how much had been raised, he went to work tweaking the design he had concocted in an effort to become more cost effective.

“He said we had some things in that original routing that would be pretty expensive to build. So, he sent his team back here to walk the site again and see if he could massage the routing and maybe drop the cost. He still hadn’t committed

to building it for us, and I didn’t know if I could afford his fee because he was probably getting $1-2 million a job,” Holder said.

With his services in demand, and in a position to pick and choose projects at his discretion, Fazio stayed on board at the bargain price of $400,000.

“He just liked the fact that we were persistent and had a dream. He liked the reasons that the golf course was being built,” Holder said.

FAZIO’S TERMS WERE SIMPLE: NO ATTORNEYS OR CONTRACTS, BUT RATHER AN OLDFASHIONED HANDSHAKE DEAL. He would deliver Holder’s golf course for not a penny more than what had been budgeted.

In return, all Holder had to do was pay his fee as well as the construction costs.

“We shook hands and that was the deal. It was six months into the project before I ever got a bill from him for anything,” Holder said.

“He is quite a guy and the kind of person that you want to do business with. I have a lot of respect for Tom Fazio way beyond his ability as a golf architect.”

With the renowned designer on board, the two had to work through philosophical differences in the course’s design. Holder wanted the hardest golf course possible to challenge the best players, while Fazio took into consideration the average player seeking an enjoyable round of golf.

PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRUCE WATERFIELD

“I wanted to bring in difficulty and drama, and he was always trying to go the opposite direction. There are still holes out there today that if I had won in the discussion would look differently than they do,” Holder said.

In hindsight, Holder admits he may have lobbied harder to infuse more teeth into a track already known for its degree of difficulty.

“I think with what I know today I would have won a few more of those arguments because it is out here for the really, really good player. It is built for tournament golf, championship golf and it is probably not a golf course that the average player is going to enjoy no matter what. It is too difficult and too challenging even with the equipment of today. It can still bring you to your knees,” Holder said.

Fazio’s creation plays no favorites regardless of handicap, which mirrors the mentality used to operate the course.

“EVERYBODY IS TREATED EQUALLY. That is the thing the whole club is based on. NOBODY GETS A DISCOUNT OUT HERE AND NO ONE GETS A COMPLIMENTARY ROUND. Everybody pays their share of the overhead from the green fee to a membership. Our golf team buys memberships just like everybody else out here. You just don’t give it away,” Holder said.

With that in mind, Holder engrained in his team an appreciation for the amount of hard work that made Karsten Creek a reality before a single Cowboy had played a shot on its Zoysia fairways.

On the Friday night before the first week of school in 1994, the head coach placed phone calls to his team with instructions to be in the course’s maintenance parking lot at 7 a.m. the next day.

“We get there and nobody was around. Fifteen minutes go by then you hear these trucks rumbling down the road. Three trucks pull in with sod pallets and behind them was Coach Holder. He just tells us to start walking down to 18. So we walk down to 18 and stand there in this dirt patch, and all of the sudden the tractors start delivering sod. From 8 o’clock until late that afternoon we laid sod. Probably threequarters of the fairway and the left side of the rough,” recounted Brian Guetz, who now serves as the team’s assistant coach.

That day in August was not the way Guetz or his teammates imagined spending their time at Karsten Creek, but one that was not without its reward.

“I remember I was smart enough to eventually go down and sod the rough along the lake. You would roll out a roll of sod, jump in the lake to cool off then go get another one. He sent Leif Westerberg home early, because he had only been in

“It was a great place for me to work on my game and be able to call home.”

RICKIE FOWLER

PHOTO / BRUCE WATERFIELD

town a couple of days from Sweden and had never seen temperatures over 85. Some people ask if that really happened, and yes it did. We helped clean up stuff on the first fairway one day, too. It is a good story, and you have a little sweat equity in it,” Guetz said.

The Windfall

Twenty years in and Karsten Creek has proven fruitful on the recruiting trail with the Cowboys being able to pluck the likes of budding stars Rickie Fowler, Peter Uihlein and Morgan Hoffmann and provide an ideal training ground for life as a professional.

When it came time to choose a school, Uihlein, a Florida resident, readily admits Karsten Creek was instrumental in his decision to leapfrog powerhouse programs closer to home.

“IT WAS HUGE. ANY TIME YOU CAN HAVE A WORLD-CLASS FACILITY IN THE PALM OF YOUR HANDS, IT IS GREATLY BENEFICIAL. I PERSONALLY FELT IT WAS THE BEST PLACE FOR ME TO HONE MY SKILLS AND GET READY FOR THE NEXT LEVEL,” HE EXPLAINED.

Hoffmann echoed the sentiments of his former teammate with a strong endorsement of his own.

“I knew this was the place I could call home and use as a golf haven to get away from everything, which I really needed. It helped my game a lot. The three years I was here I got so much better, and it helped me get to the PGA Tour,” he said.

Fowler’s perspective on his college stomping grounds validates Holder’s vision for providing a golf course with the program serving as its top priority.

“KARSTEN CREEK IS ONE-OF-A-KIND when you look at it as far as it is the golf team’s course. You see other golf teams around the country have courses to practice at, but sometimes it is the university golf course. Sometimes they just have memberships. This is actually the Oklahoma State golf team’s golf course, and you are able to come out here and work on your game and be here on a daily basis,” Fowler said.

“As far as condition goes, it is probably one of the best-conditioned golf courses I have seen on a yearly basis. It was a great place for me to work on my game and be able to call home.”

Karsten Creek has proven so beneficial, the likes of LPGA standout Karin Sjödin and PGA performer Chris Tidland chose to put down roots in Stillwater, achieving another of Holder’s goals.

“It fused everything together,” Tidland said. “Coach Holder made it clear to me when it first opened. He told Alan (Bratton, now OSU’s men coach) and me he wanted guys to stay around here. Before that I hadn’t really thought about living here. Once it was open and we had access to a world-class practice area and golf course is when it first became an idea. It quickly became a reality when I turned pro. Karsten Creek was the thing that got us thinking about that. Our love for everything around here made the decision easy,” Tidland said.

“The cool thing about what Alan and I have been able to do is see it transform from truly the initial clear cutting to laying the sod to seeing the first day that the course was open to being able to play it before there was a clubhouse. And now being a part of the finished product,” Guetz said.

“We have seen the transformation and there’s only been a few people — Coach Holder, maybe a handful of donors, that have been around and seen what the last 20 years have entailed from the beginning to the end. It has been pretty cool to see that, and I can’t believe it has been 20 years.”

Not only has Karsten Creek helped propel its teams to success at OSU and beyond, it has helped inspire those Cowboys to pay it forward for the benefit of their alma mater.

“A lot of the principles we stand for are why our players are loyal and they do come back and they do give back. They support golf and they support the other sports here. I think that comes from the fact that all that we have is through the generosity of other people, and they understand that their role, once they use that to their advantage and go out into the world and made a living, is to give back and do the same thing and make it just as significant and just as great an experience for the next generation of OSU golfers,” Holder said.

“THEY ARE ALL-IN FOR OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSITY.”

PHOTO / BRUCE WATERFIELD

As consumers, all of us receive messages designed to appeal to our senses and thus, our ability to purchase products, services or experiences. Those messages come to us from morning through night, packed in a multitude of packages. Perhaps the most powerful package is television. TV has changed a lot in the last 40 years.

The marketing profession decided a few years ago to coin a phrase. This phrase can be found in many marketing books across the country.

“JUMPING THE SHARK.”

The phrase, “jumping the shark” is derived from the 1970s hit show Happy Days. The long-running situation comedy had good writers and was able to keep a critical, consistent cast of actors around long enough to be wildly popular for a long time and for decades in syndication.

During one of the final years of the show, an episode was set in Hollywood. As The Fonz tried to prove himself “cool” in California, the script called for him to jump over a shark held in an underwater tank on a pair of water skis. He did and was just as cool in California as he was back home in Milwaukee. As marketers look back on the episode, they consider

this a dead-end moment for the creators of the show. The feeling was the writers had run out of good ideas.

Sure enough, the shark episode was considered the beginning of the end for Happy Days. Did the end come because of the “shark” episode or despite it? Regardless, when some marketers see a last desperate attempt of a company or a person to garner business by any means, it is described as “jumping the shark.”

I’m not sure we have any shark jumping on TV today, but we have some weird programming. We have a show called Naked and Afraid. Two people who don’t know each other are stripped naked and dropped in some desolate location to survive on their own for 21 days. Really? I have an idea for a show. How about “WE ARE AFRAID BECAUSE YOU ARE NAKED.” Bring back Laverne and Shirley … OR SOMETHING. These shock and awe shows are designed for advertisers to sell you and me more items. That’s where the idea of BRAND LOYALTY comes into view. All of us buy certain things because they have been “loyal” to us and us to them, for years. Perhaps it’s a brand of boots or jeans, golf balls or makeup, chips or cola. It also translates into larger-ticket items, and these

loyalties run deep. Ask a fan of NASCAR whose father always bought Chevrolets if their family roots for a driver on the circuit who drives a Ford. Never.

Sometimes, as consumers, our favorite brands have a hiccup or two. ONE OF THE THINGS I BELIEVE SETS OUR FAN BASE APART FROM MANY IS LOYALTY TO THE BRAND. You won’t find our OSU apparel in the trash can after a few losses. We tend to take a long view. Success is often measured in terms of marathons and not sprints. A few things you have to realize about sports and keeping score: eventually you will lose a few and because of that, you can’t tie your life’s meaning to a game. :)

I’d like to give that NASCAR thing a try. Thousands of fans. Speed. A powerful car with lots of brilliant, bright colors.

I WOULD LIKE ONE IN A BRIGHT SHADE OF … ORANGE .

GO POKES!

KYLE WRAY VICE PRESIDENT ENROLLMENT MANAGEMENT & MARKETING

WHEN ASKED TO SPEAK ABOUT MARKETING, I OFTEN TELL THE AUDIENCE HOW CRUCIAL IT IS TO KNOW YOUR TARGET MARKET. THEN I TRY TO PROVE I UNDERSTAND IT MYSELF IN THE REMAINDER OF THE SPEECH. IF YOU ARE READING THIS, YOU CERTAINLY MEET SEVERAL IMPORTANT CRITERION ON A LIST OF FACTORS PARAMOUNT TO OKLAHOMA STATE UNIVERSITY.