A statue of Wichita’s Barry Sanders is coming outside Oklahoma State football stadium
More than three decades after his collegiate playing career, Wichita native Barry Sanders, who has a claim as football’s greatest running back of all-time, is being immortalized at Oklahoma State.
Sanders, who played at Oklahoma State from 1986-88, will become just the second player to have his name and jersey number added to the prgram’s Ring of Honor in a ceremony on Nov. 13 as part of the Cowboys’ game against TCU.
Sanders will also be the first player to have a statue, which is currently in the works, be featured outside of Boone Pickens Stadium.
Sanders joins the former running back he was a backup to, Thurman Thomas, who was inducted last year, as the only members of Oklahoma State football’s Ring of Honor.
In his lone season as a starter, the Wichita North high school graduate produced one of the best seasons in college football history when he ran for 2,850 yards — an average of 237.5 per game — scored 44 touchdowns, broke 34 NCAA records and won the 1988 Heisman Trophy.
“If he were playing in today’s offenses, he very well could’ve rushed for 4,000 yards, easy,” current OSU coach Mike Gundy, who was the starting quarterback on that 1988 team, told ESPN back in 2018. “Look at the number of plays that we have on offense today compared to back then.
“We huddled up, we were slow. And the majority of the games, very seldom was he ever touching the field in the fourth quarter, because we were blowing teams out.”
The No. 21 jersey Sanders wore during his college days is one of four numbers not in use currently at Oklahoma State.
After his breakout season, Sanders left early for the NFL Draft was the No. 3 overall pick by the Detroit Lions in 1989. He was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2004 after rushing for 15,269 yards in 10 NFL seasons.
This story was originally published July 23, 2021 at 6:00 AM.
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