Mike Boynton Fired After Seven Seasons with Oklahoma State
Oklahoma State has announced its decision to part ways with head basketball coach Mike Boynton after seven seasons with the program.
OSU athletic director Chad Weiberg made the announcement just two days after Oklahoma State’s season ended in the Big 12 Tournament with a 77-62 loss to conference newcomer UCF.
“For seven years, Coach Boynton has led this program and represented this university with class,” Weiberg said. “We’re grateful for the genuine passion and care he has for the student-athletes on our team. Unfortunately, the desired results have not followed. Therefore, it is time to part ways and begin a new chapter. We wish Coach Boynton and his family the very best.”
The Cowboys ended the 2023-24 season with a 12-20 record, the program’s worst finish since the second year of Boynton’s tenure in Stillwater. However, it’s the sixth time in seven seasons under Boynton that the Pokes will miss the NCAA Tournament.
Oklahoma State ended the year on a six-game skid and seemed to lose any momentum it might’ve gained midseason before heading to Kansas City for the Big 12 Tournament.
After the season-ending loss to UCF, Boynton was asked about his future with the Cowboys, the second time in a week he’d been asked that question.
Last week, Boynton said he didn’t “have any reason to believe he won’t return next season.”
However, things sounded a bit different on Tuesday afternoon.
“I know that’s a topic out there – I don’t know,” Boynton said. “I’m not in a position to give an answer to that. And I really haven’t, honestly, at this point, today, thought about it at all. My whole focus was trying to win this game and get back to the hotel and hopefully be preparing right now to figure out how to beat a team we just lost to Saturday. So, there’ll be a time for that – no doubt about it. I don’t know when that time is. It’ll come soon. But today, I’ve not given an ounce of consideration to it.”
He also acknowledged that 12-20 wasn’t good enough and that the team would need to make some serious changes going forward.
“Obviously, 12-20 isn’t good enough, and I’m not shying away from that,” Boynton said. “There are things we all need to do as a collective group to get better, and we’ll adjust those things once we get back to campus.”
Despite some feeling that he deserved one more year with the Pokes, Boynton is now out and Oklahoma State will be searching for his successor heading into a new-look Big 12 Conference in 2024-25.
