Gundy calls out Ducks' budget; Lanning fires back

Oklahoma State head coach Mike Gundy and Oregon head coach Dan Lanning are unexpectedly giving the Week 2 matchup between their teams some extra juice.

While speaking on his radio show on Monday, Gundy said Oklahoma State spent "around $7 million" on their team over the last three years before making a reference to how much the Ducks have spent on their roster in recent years.

"I think Oregon spent close to $40 (million) last year alone," Gundy said. "So, that was just one year. Now, I might be off a few million."

Gundy made several other comments about Oregon's resources -- he pointed out Ducks' quarterback Dante Moore and said that "it'll cost a lot of money to keep him" and went as far as to posit the notion that Oregon's budget should determine the programs they schedule outside of the Big Ten.

"Oregon is paying a lot, a lot of money for their team," Gundy said. "From a nonconference standpoint there's coaches saying they should [play teams with similar budgets]."

On Monday night during his weekly news conference, Lanning was asked about Gundy's comments and responded.

"If you want to be a top 10 team in college football, you better be invested in winning. We spend to win," Lanning said. "Some people save to have an excuse for why they don't ... I can't speak on their situation; I have no idea what they got in their pockets over there."

Lanning added that he has "a lot of respect" for Gundy and praised the way Gundy has been able to consistently lead his team to winning seasons over his 20-year tenure in Stillwater. Both teams are 1-0 so far this season; the Ducks are ranked inside the top 10 and are expected to be one of the teams vying for a return to the College Football Playoff.

"Over the last 3 to 5 years they've elevated themselves. They have a lot of resources," Gundy said. "They've got 'em stacked out there pretty good right now."

Last year, Georgia head coach Kirby Smart also made a reference to Oregon's resources saying, at SEC media days, that he wishes he could get "some of that NIL money" that Oregon alum and Nike founder Phil Knight "has been sharing with Dan Lanning."

"I think it's impressive that guys like Kirby have been signing the number one class in the nation without any NIL money this entire time," Lanning joked back at Smart during Big Ten media days last year. "Obviously, coach Smart took a little shot at us. But if you want to be a top-10 team in college football, you better have great support. We have that."

While Smart and Lanning's barbs with each other had the tone of two coaches who have worked together in the past (Lanning was Georgia's defensive coordinator from 2019 to 2021), the back-and-forth with Gundy on Monday was unexpected.

"I'm sure UT-Martin maybe didn't have as much as them last week, and they played," Lanning said of OSU. "So we'll let it play out."