By Ryan Clarke | The Oregonian/OregonLive
Publication Date: 2026-01-13 01:44:00
CORVALLIS — It has been a long few weeks for new Oregon State football coach JaMarcus Shephard. Between building out his staff and navigating the chaos of the transfer portal, he hasn’t had much sleep.
But when asked in a wide-ranging interview Monday with The Oregonian/OregonLive about Nvidia and its billionaire founder and CEO, Jensen Huang, the typically energetic football coach’s eyes lit up.
Shephard leaned forward and spoke directly into the iPhone recording the interview, as if Huang was listening on the other line.
“Jensen,” he said. “If you ever want to talk football with me, I’m all in, OK? I’m all in.”
Huang is an OSU alum. As one of the world’s richest individuals with a net worth estimated at more than $160 billion, he could sell a small portion of his Nvidia stock and immediately bankroll OSU football into national championship contention while still retaining 99% of his wealth.
It is a fantasy whispered about on Oregon State message boards and daydreamed by those occupying the stands at Reser Stadium. But could it actually happen?
Shephard, who has never spoken to Huang, doesn’t pretend to know. But he said he met with representatives from Nvidia about utilizing artificial intelligence to make the OSU football program more efficient.
“I’m all ears, you know?” Shephard said. “I think the biggest problem sometimes is coaches, they want to hold everything in. They don’t want people to get ahold of their information. And that’s one of…
