David Pollack wants Bedlam to return in nonconference scheduling

Oklahoma and Oklahoma State didn’t meet on the gridiron last season for the first time since 1909. On See Ball Get Ball, college football expert David Pollack made the case for reviving the beloved “Bedlam” rivalry game.

“Let’s bring some fun back, some hatred back between fan bases. Instead of just doing a new one-off,” Pollack said. “You got Bedlam, Oklahoma State-Oklahoma. That is something that people can identify with that have identified with for years and years and years, and it’s such a big game. Why not bring that back?

“That’s an easy nonconference fix. And again, if it’s about revenue — which a lot of the times it is — now, we don’t want to split revenue, or give it to one side and then give to the other. That’s the problem. But, you got a great quality opponent… It’s going to be a packed house, no doubt about it. There’s going to be a lot of buzz. It’ll be on national television. It’ll be a big game, as opposed to some of the other games we have.”

Oklahoma and Oklahoma State’s lack of a meeting last season coincided with the Sooners’ move to the SEC. Alas, Pollack doesn’t believe that the storied rivalry should end simply due to inconvenience.

After all, 40 years of the rivalry’s games were played without the teams belonging to the same conference. Unfortunately for Bedlam hopefuls like Pollack, the return of the rivalry game seems unlikely in the near future.

The next season the Sooners and Cowboys have each yet to schedule a Power Four school in the nonconference is 2031. In fairness, there are rare incidents where game agreements fall through and spots on a team’s schedule open up, but those are rare.

If the rivalry game does return, Oklahoma State has a lot of ground to make up. Oklahoma boasts an all-time 91-20-7 record against the Cowboys. However, it’s worth noting that Oklahoma State had the last laugh.

The Cowboys defeated the Sooners 27-24 when they last met on Nov. 4, 2023. In March, Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy proposed that the rival programs face off against each other in an annual spring game, but the idea didn’t come to fruition.

“Honestly, for us, we should do a home and home with OU in the spring,” Gundy said. “They should come here on the 19th. I think their’s is earlier in the year, we should go down there and play a home-and-home against each other in the spring.

“Charge $25 a head, they can use it for NIL, we can use it for NIL. If they don’t want to do two in one spring, we can do one here this year, do it there next year, and split the gate. Because we get tired of practicing against each other.”