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[solesrfr]

My only issue with this is that you don't have to be a great coach to be successful at Wisky. Their system is intact and doesn't change when they change coaches. I wish we could be like that as if we change we turn everything upside down. Solich won a lot of games inheriting TO's players and system. When he ran out of players and had to change coaches, he struggled!

That would require NU has an AD like Alvarez. In the long run I think I will prefer how NU has done it.



C

 

[Greatest Fan of All]

My only issue with this is that you don't have to be a great coach to be successful at Wisky. Their system is intact and doesn't change when they change coaches. I wish we could be like that as if we change we turn everything upside down. Solich won a lot of games inheriting TO's players and system. When he ran out of players and had to change coaches, he struggled!

You don't have to be a great coach to be successful anywhere. There are very few great coaches. But, even at Wisky, you'd better be a really good coach or you will fail...even being in a really bad division.

 

[berryhusker]

Yes, great recruiters can recruit anywhere. But average recruiters can look good at one place and not as good at another. Pelini's staff probably wouldn't land the #1 class year in and year out at a top SEC school, but they would pull higher ranked classes than they did at Nebraska. It's simply easier to recruit in some places (with high population centers) than it is at others. To suggest otherwise ignores reality.

This is an incredibly fallacious argument. It may be your belief but there is nothing to support such a bold supposition.

 

[berryhusker]

The fact that he mentions 2 walk-ons as starters undermines the premise that our DE recruiting was going just fine. I'm a huge supporter of our walk-on program and love the guys who play on their own dime and fight for a scholarship. But when you have to rely on players who are decent but not great (these aren't NFL caliber walk-ons like years past) then there is a problem. Can someone please name another successful P5 program with a walk-on DE or 2? Our DE recruiting was atrocious under Pelini, arguing anything but that is just biased, revisionist history.

I believe 2015 our DE depth chart had 50% walk-ons on the 2 deep and I think escalated our issue of pass rushing.

Yes! Thank you. It seems obvious to most folks that DE recruiting under Bo was abysmal. Why some won't admit it is beyond me... it is similar to the political loyalty stance of 'party before country'; instead it is 'coach before program'...

 

[CO4NU]

I also want to sort of touch on the comments I see on this board here and there about Riley being an "average" coach because of his record at OSU.

I'm not saying Riley is going to be Jimbo Fisher at Nebraska or anything, but for people to have a preconceived notion that Riley is an average coach because of his W/L record at a place like Oregon State is crazy. To me that sort of thinking is short sided, bias driven or flat out naive.

Let's just first bring up that he was first hired away by the NFL. Why would an NFL team hire a college coach if he was just average, doing an average job? Look at the history of college coaches who get hired by the NFL. The vast majority of them at the time of their hire were considered to be among the best coaches in college football.

Ok, Nebraska isn't the NFL and you don't want to hear that...well then why would USC (on two separate occasions), Alabama and UCLA have offered him their coaching gigs over the years if he were so average? Schools like USC and UCLA saw first-hand what he was able to accomplish in the Pac-12. If they wanted him, what do you make of that?

If Riley would have just parlayed his time at OSU toward a job at USC or Alabama, he would probably have a different reputation than what some give him now. The OSU job is a lot like a job at, say, Vanderbilt. James Franklin was just smart enough to move up to Penn State after his success there. Now he is viewed as one of the young up and coming coaches. Franklin, like Riley, took the same sort of vigor on the recruiting trail and a system that worked for him at Vandy and tag teamed that with Penn State's money, facilties, etc. The same thing Riley is doing. Had he stayed at Vandy, he would have surely experienced the peaks and valleys that Riley did at OSU.

I just hope the same people who fault Riley for the limitations at OSU, will do the reverse for Gary Anderson now that he is in that predicament. I hope they put Anderson's 19 wins at Wisconsin in perspective. Disregard his division title. Once he struggles at OSU, shouldn't we hear the same "average coach" cries? People who think he duplicates his Wisconsin success in Corvallis are going to be sorely mistaken. No chance he wins a conference or even division title. No way.

IMPO he was a great hire for OSU because he was at Utah State for a good while and knows the recruiting footprint. His ceiling though is going to be finishing 4th in the Pac-12....North that is. There is NO WAY he builds a consistent winner at OSU. He will leave as soon as he does good enough to get a better job. That's what a place like OSU is for. Anderson wanted the heck out of Wisky, otherwise he wouldn't have taken that job. Riley's loyalty hurt his reputation...to the casual or biased fan that is.

EXCELLENT post.

 

[Native]

Anderson wanted the heck out of Wisky, otherwise he wouldn't have taken that job. Riley's loyalty hurt his reputation...to the casual or biased fan that is.

What was the reason for wanting out of Bucky-ville?

 

[Red Reign]

What was the reason for wanting out of Bucky-ville?

The AD

 

[NUinID]

The AD

I would say that it is part of it. Anderson was culturally a bad fit in Wisconsin.

 

[Greatest Fan of All]

The AD

I think Bielema left for the same general reason...too much micro-managing. For all his talk of wanting to be like Devaney, Barry is way off the mark as an AD.

 

[Native]

I think Bielema left for the same general reason...too much micro-managing. For all his talk of wanting to be like Devaney, Barry is way off the mark as an AD.

Former Husker, only option is blind defense of him. ;D

 

[Red Reign]

I think Bielema left for the same general reason...too much micro-managing. For all his talk of wanting to be like Devaney, Barry is way off the mark as an AD.

Yup

 

[Huskerthom]

I think Bielema left for the same general reason...too much micro-managing. For all his talk of wanting to be like Devaney, Barry is way off the mark as an AD.

Also I recall both of these coaches talking about the difficulty getting kids qualified for entrance to Wisky. They have tough entrance criteria.

 

[ShortSideOption]

Also I recall both of these coaches talking about the difficulty getting kids qualified for entrance to Wisky. They have tough entrance criteria.

Bielema also has stated publicly that pay for his assistant coaches was a reason he left. He lost 3 assistants in one year due to not being able to pay them what others were asking. May be an AD issue as well I suppose.

 

[Chi-Town Cube]

My only issue with this is that you don't have to be a great coach to be successful at Wisky. Their system is intact and doesn't change when they change coaches. I wish we could be like that as if we change we turn everything upside down. Solich won a lot of games inheriting TO's players and system. When he ran out of players and had to change coaches, he struggled!

Wisconsin also hasn't changed coaches due to firing from poor results. Big difference there as well.

Alvarez retired
Bielema took another job
Andersen took another job
Now Cryst.

The stability is a big part of it.

Nebraska fans, alumni, and administration have been looking for a quick fix since 2003 that isn't there.

It takes time to build a culture, but no time to tear it down.

 

[Chi-Town Cube]

I also want to sort of touch on the comments I see on this board here and there about Riley being an "average" coach because of his record at OSU.

I'm not saying Riley is going to be Jimbo Fisher at Nebraska or anything, but for people to have a preconceived notion that Riley is an average coach because of his W/L record at a place like Oregon State is crazy. To me that sort of thinking is short sided, bias driven or flat out naive.

Let's just first bring up that he was first hired away by the NFL. Why would an NFL team hire a college coach if he was just average, doing an average job? Look at the history of college coaches who get hired by the NFL. The vast majority of them at the time of their hire were considered to be among the best coaches in college football.

Ok, Nebraska isn't the NFL and you don't want to hear that...well then why would USC (on two separate occasions), Alabama and UCLA have offered him their coaching gigs over the years if he were so average? Schools like USC and UCLA saw first-hand what he was able to accomplish in the Pac-12. If they wanted him, what do you make of that?

If Riley would have just parlayed his time at OSU toward a job at USC or Alabama, he would probably have a different reputation than what some give him now. The OSU job is a lot like a job at, say, Vanderbilt. James Franklin was just smart enough to move up to Penn State after his success there. Now he is viewed as one of the young up and coming coaches. Franklin, like Riley, took the same sort of vigor on the recruiting trail and a system that worked for him at Vandy and tag teamed that with Penn State's money, facilties, etc. The same thing Riley is doing. Had he stayed at Vandy, he would have surely experienced the peaks and valleys that Riley did at OSU.

I just hope the same people who fault Riley for the limitations at OSU, will do the reverse for Gary Anderson now that he is in that predicament. I hope they put Anderson's 19 wins at Wisconsin in perspective. Disregard his division title. Once he struggles at OSU, shouldn't we hear the same "average coach" cries? People who think he duplicates his Wisconsin success in Corvallis are going to be sorely mistaken. No chance he wins a conference or even division title. No way.

IMPO he was a great hire for OSU because he was at Utah State for a good while and knows the recruiting footprint. His ceiling though is going to be finishing 4th in the Pac-12....North that is. There is NO WAY he builds a consistent winner at OSU. He will leave as soon as he does good enough to get a better job. That's what a place like OSU is for. Anderson wanted the heck out of Wisky, otherwise he wouldn't have taken that job. Riley's loyalty hurt his reputation...to the casual or biased fan that is.

Post of the year right here