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5 Keys to Improving the Husker Football Program
- Thread starter Adam Carriker
- Start date
Good list, Adam.
The top two speak volumes to what the teams of the '90s had and what championship level teams have today. Fast, strong teams that have the mental edge are always fun to watch and handle adversity very well. My favorite part of the podcast (below) is where you are talking about mentality.
The top two speak volumes to what the teams of the '90s had and what championship level teams have today. Fast, strong teams that have the mental edge are always fun to watch and handle adversity very well. My favorite part of the podcast (below) is where you are talking about mentality.
imho the increase in the number of bowl games since 1995 has resulted in the "9 wins are okay" philosophy. In 1995 36 teams worked to get to the highest number of wins possible to be eligible for one of the 18 bowl games, as the number of bowls increased the win totals went all the way down to 6 and now lately 5 games to become bowl eligible, everyone now is eligible for a participation trophy. Right now teams can get an F on the season (win 50% of their games) and still be allowed to go to a bowl. Today's football players are rewarded for an average season and unless you are playing for the NC why should they put forth so much effort to achieve greatness we are going to reward them even if they are mediocre.
It has nothing to do with giving players participation trophies and everything to do with ESPN needing, and paying top dollar for, college football inventory.
I do highly recommend coaches rotating players in and out a lot to keep them fresh. Here's something I've never said publicly. My senior year we would sub quite a bit on the D line. But before our first game my D Line coach John Blake pulled me aside and said, I'm not going to sub for you. There will be 3 guys running in the game and 3 guys running out, you will just stay out there 95% of the time and that's just what he did. I'll never forget when we played Kansas that year, we won in OT. But on defense that game we played 107 snaps, I played 99 of them. Now I'd be lying if I said I went 100% every single one of those plays. But my point is this, it's a mentality, it's an attitude. There were things I was good at and there were definitely things I could have done better on the football field, but it always meant a great deal to me leave it all on the field, because that was something I could control. Btw, I hate it when I see guys tap their helmets and come out of the game. I always thought it was the coaches job to sub people in and out. I always looked at tapping out of a game like saying Uncle to your sibling or a professional wrestler tapping out in a major match. I'd rather be exhausted and in pain than do that. To me that was admitting defeat. I will say this, sometimes digression is the better part of valor and I may not have been that smart at the time, but that was my attitude then, right or wrong.
In my mind it's simple:
1- Recruit athletes. Develop them. Find advantages schematically with your personnel.
2- Attitude and Championship Expectations.
3- It's now time to find our coach. Evaluation starts now and ends in 2 seasons.
4- Find an identity. On offense, defense and as a team.
5- Elevate the Walk On program. This should be a big advantage for us.
1- Recruit athletes. Develop them. Find advantages schematically with your personnel.
2- Attitude and Championship Expectations.
3- It's now time to find our coach. Evaluation starts now and ends in 2 seasons.
4- Find an identity. On offense, defense and as a team.
5- Elevate the Walk On program. This should be a big advantage for us.
Sometimes simple solutions are the most elegant! Agree wholeheartedly with your assessment. But a few additional comments/questions:
- Is there some way to quantify the development of athletes? In the "old days" Nebraska had a reputation as a place to walk on. I always believed that one of TO's strengths was the ability to coach players up. Is there some way to actually build a reputation along that line. I'm sure that every program says it . . . is there a way to show it and have it play in the recruiting process?
- WRT #3, would it be advisable for the AD to absolutely state that MR is the coach for the next X number of years? It would seem to me that there would be a real plus to the program to show coaching stability - something we used to have. At one time recruits knew who the coaches would be and what schemes were to be run for the entire time they would be at Nebraska. In recent years the changes in coaches and resulting changes in styles of play might cause a potential recruit to question how he might fit in the scheme of the next staff that is only a 6 loss season away.
- Fully agree with #5, but have also read that the increasing cost of tuition for out of state players makes it much more difficult for them to travel to Lincoln and pay their way until they've proven themselves as scholarship material. Don't have a solution for this, or even if it's a valid concern.
Thanks for your ongoing, thoughtful, and "right on" analysis.
1- I think having Boyd Epley is huge. He has that exact reputation. One thing they used to have was the point testing system (they did away with my sophomore year). This showed where you were at the beginning of winter or summer conditioning and how much you improved by the end. This spurred great competition among incoming freshman to show who was better coming in. This spurred great competition among individual groups like the D Line or what have you. I was well aware of this before I got there and loved that. If they haven't, they should bring that back. It not only helps breed competition on the team, it's something that is very enticing to recruits. They also used to have the Platform, and nobody was allowed to stand or sit on it unless your name was on it. There was only a certain number of Huskers in history who earned their way on it, it was very prestigious and something people strived for for years. I know about not sitting on it, because my first day as a freshman I sat down and didn't realize it and they ripped my butt apart for it. They got rid of that as well. They should definitely bring it back!
2- Yes and no. Yes because you want recruits to feel that stability. No because if Riley doesn't work out in a couple years, you don't want to look like a liar.
3- I completely understand and relate to this. But honestly, most walk ons come from inside the state of Nebraska. As mentioned in the video, we used to get 2-3 star athletes to walk on, especially from Nebraska. It wouldn't be hard to come out publicly and let it be known that our walk on program is going to be elevated and have much more of an emphasis put back on it. Then talk about all the successful walk ons we've had in the past and how valuable the walk on program is to the team. I don't think it would take much to make it very prestigious to young players across the state of Nebraska again. It used to be just getting asked to come down to Lincoln at all was a big deal. Also, increasing the number will make it more enticing, competitive and helpful to the team.
2- Yes and no. Yes because you want recruits to feel that stability. No because if Riley doesn't work out in a couple years, you don't want to look like a liar.
3- I completely understand and relate to this. But honestly, most walk ons come from inside the state of Nebraska. As mentioned in the video, we used to get 2-3 star athletes to walk on, especially from Nebraska. It wouldn't be hard to come out publicly and let it be known that our walk on program is going to be elevated and have much more of an emphasis put back on it. Then talk about all the successful walk ons we've had in the past and how valuable the walk on program is to the team. I don't think it would take much to make it very prestigious to young players across the state of Nebraska again. It used to be just getting asked to come down to Lincoln at all was a big deal. Also, increasing the number will make it more enticing, competitive and helpful to the team.
My brother in law walked on at Nebraska because that was his life long dream. He had offers from smaller schools but he turned them down. I look at it like pro wrestling, if the champion keeps losing non title matches then the championship belt means less. But there are also things you can do to elevate the championship belt to make it worth more. It's the same with the walk on program. It's all in how you handle it and present it. In short, it's a PR move, which is what a lot of recruiting is, and you're basically recruiting guys to walk on to Nebraska, rather than guarantee themselves an appearance in the Poinsettia bowl every year somewhere else.
To your point though, you're absolutely right. I think the target would be to get Nebraska boys to walk on. It'll be much tougher with kids from out of state. But in state kids, achieving you're childhood dream sometimes means much more. I've seen that first hand. Also, in state tuition vs out of state tuition makes a big difference too.
I have an idea for the walk on program. Eply brought back the "performance index" explained in this prophetic (concerning the OL) article below. Perhaps the Huskers need to set up a walk on try out day and guarntee that any athlete that scores a 1500 (or some slightly lower mark determined by Eply) on the performance index has a walk on spot. They could tailor the score levels to specific positions, if deemed necessary. This would give local kids a goal to work toward and might up the quality of walk on athletes. The University could make a big deal of the try out with the help of local media. Just a thought...
http://www.omaha.com/huskers/boyd-e...cle_1a7c4940-a387-11e5-9643-0bc10d4a2c5d.html
The Performance Index is what I was referring to. As for your idea, I love it! It would probably have to be a slightly lower mark to be fair, but besides that, like I said the walk on program has been and can once again be a huge advantage for us. I don't think it would be that hard to do things like this to elevate it once again.
To this day it still bothers me they got rid of the Platform and the Performance Index to begin with. To me that was part of Husker tradition and it was great motivation as well.
