The Beavers’ athletic director and new coach have a crucial task ahead as they rebuild the OSU football program.
CORVALLIS — The belief is mutual.
While Oregon State is placing its hopes in master motivational speaker JaMarcus Shephard to lead the football program, the Beavers’ new head coach described on Tuesday linking arms and going to battle with athletic director Scott Barnes.
It is a moment of survival for the Beavers, after all, as they enter the new Pac-12 Conference. And both parties are taking risks; Barnes by hiring a first-time head coach, and Shephard as he hitches his wagon to a man facing intense criticism from those in and around Corvallis wearing orange and black.
Is the money there? Will OSU be able to build a competitive roster given current resources? What will the next few weeks look like with early national signing day and the transfer portal opening?
“Certainly, most people get hung up on the NIL end of it,” Shephard said of his questions during the interview process at OSU. “That’s usually a lot of the first questions that people have, but I just wanted to know that I was going to have a partner in this whole process. I just wanted to know that Scott was ready to go to war with me.”
The Beavers have been dealing with a battle on their own front, long before Shephard swaggered into Reser Stadium and started winning hearts and minds.
OSU’s athletic department faces institutional upheaval following the departure of its deputy athletic director, a multimillion-dollar lawsuit filed by a former rowing coach against OSU and Barnes, and outside questions about its NIL management deal with Blueprint Sports. The football team is coming off one of the worst seasons in program history, 2-10, which included a home loss to previously winless Sam Houston State and firing Trent Bray after an 0-7 start.
Despite newfound conference stability, OSU remains on the outside looking in at the darlings of the college football world. It may always be. But there is still potential to compete and perhaps thrive in the Group of Six, and Shephard and Barnes say they want to create a path to the College Football Playoff for OSU through perennial Pac-12 championships.
That makes setting Shephard up for success all the more crucial for Barnes as OSU tries to be a leader among — not catch up with — those joining the conference Barnes spent so much of his time and energy to rebuild.
“I think that Oregon State is, we are set up perfectly to compete in this NIL world,” Shephard said. “We’re set up right where we need to be. I think that when looking at this opportunity, I felt like we were going to be at the top of our conference in terms of how we were going to be able to compete within our league. And even in some spaces, across the West Coast and the rest of the country. ”
Barnes did not disclose the numbers for OSU in terms of revenue share money to spend this offseason, but the department did raise a record $11.6 million for athletics last quarter.
Barnes smiled and said Shephard’s ability to relate to people will come in handy in rooms full of wealthy donors. And on the team-building front, Shephard called the NIL question a “non-issue” for him in accepting this job.
The money set aside for Shephard’s assistant coaches will be less than recent years, but competitive with schools in the reconfigured Pac-12, Barnes told The Oregonian/OregonLive.
“It’ll be top of the new Pac-12,” Barnes said of the assistant coach salary pool. “We’ll have $5 million total, $3 million for assistant salaries and $2 million for staff. With interchangeable funding.”
In two seasons under Trent Bray, the assistant coaches salary budget was $4.85 million per year, though OSU spent $3.75 million in 2025 and $4.16 million in 2024. In Jonathan Smith’s final season, 2023, OSU went to its salary cap of $4.75 million to pay its 10 assistant coaches.
The details of Shephard’s own contract have yet to be disclosed.
Shephard said he envisions building a staff of developers, not just recruiters. But he did push for a general manager during the hiring process, when there had previously been questions about Barnes’ lack of commitment to such a hire after the departure of former OSU general manager Kyle Bjornstad.
“We both agree that the traditional NFL GM, as it is at Stanford, where the football coach reports to the GM, that’s what I mean as more of a misnomer,” Barnes told The Oregonian/OregonLive. “We will have a player personnel, NIL, GM, whatever you want to call it. We will have someone in place, and (Shephard) and I will define what that job description is. It’s never been a matter of not having a position. It’s about what is the role of the position?
“Having someone dedicated to football is our next step. Prior to, what we had was somebody who did football and everything else. This one will be dedicated to football, and that’s where we need to go. That’s the evolution of the position.”
Shephard was clear about the necessity of a GM to compete in the marketplace for players. He also admitted to arriving on the job with a lot of work to do on the recruiting front, especially on a local level, where OSU has failed of late to bring in the volume of local talent he believes it should.
That foundation, along with acquiring current college players in the transfer portal when that window opens Jan. 2, will define what Shephard’s first roster will look like in 2026.
“We could have done it and filled out an entire roster,” Shephard said. “But I do believe that a nucleus of our football team needs to come from the local areas, from Oregon and within a five-hour radius of this institution. Why? Because I think that those young men are the ones that create part of the culture. They’re taking people back home for Thanksgiving. They’re taking people to the lake and taking them skiing, and they understand the landscape of the area that we’re in.”
Shephard mentioned Thanksgiving twice at Tuesday’s press conference. The other mention was in recounting how he found out he was hired by the Beavers: at his home in Tuscaloosa with several Alabama wide receivers and their girlfriends in attendance. An example of his unique dedication to building meaningful relationships with players.
Shephard’s motivational speaking style, emotional intelligence and ability to relate to people will be important resources in the months to come as OSU football hits the reset button. But the athletic institution will need to follow suit, and the question remains just how much of a fight the duo of Shephard and Barnes can put up as chaos continues to swirl around the sport.
For his part, Shephard enthusiastically described himself as a fighter, having grown up with little money and been instilled from an early age a blue-collar work ethic — one he believes will match the place he’s tasked with leading.
“I fought for everything that I have,” Shephard said. “And I’ll continue to fight for the young men that are in this program. I’ll continue to fight for Oregon State University.”
