Terps Sports

I've been driving this bandwagon for a while

I disagree with the premise. I'm ok with the idea of a system approach because it would make it easier but if we hired a coach who had the right mix of media savy, relationship building, recruiting and coaching skills he'd win and would also generate real interest which would enable us to build off the natural resources (tv market, recruiting base, strong NFL alumni presence, great school, UA backing, etc...) we have here to become a legit power. Imagine if we had the start to this year with UA doing the uniforms and the nationally televised game hype but also had a guy like a USC era Pete Carroll as our coach. That would have been the springboard to really big things. More so than a system we need the right guy to lead the program.

At this point I don't think we can hire anyone BUT a system coach. I'd love to be wrong but unless we just completely luck out and hit the lottery with a HOF type coach, there are just too many hurdles to overcome here. It's hard to imagine a regular pro style joe coming here and winning (8-4 or better) with any consistency. It's all a factor of the recruiting cycle and sometimes we'll have good talent but other times we'll be unlucky and have down years. We'll never build a fanbase unless we win consistently without any interruptions. It's just the nature of the school/area.

Playing in the ACC could be our biggest asset. If we could find a coach with the right offense (Chip Kelly was the OC at New Hampshire) there's no way the bad and middle-tier ACC teams can stop that. We'd be better than 80% of ACC teams in any given year. It would just be the top 4 who would have the talent/coaching to beat us and even then we'd be able to beat the recent versions of FSU/Miami/VT/Clemson. If we can win and put up a ton of points like that for a few years, we'd probably even start pulling the kind of local recruits that we haven't been able to get.

I think a previous poster had it right. Rich Rodriguez.

I think Plank will write a check after the Notre Dame game

He is a graduate of the Univ of Md system; ok enough on this topic

Bobby Wilder at ODU has built a team from nothing and beat JMU yesterday.

He might want to build another team from zero.

As are countless Frostburg grads...

I hope Plank & UA drops us for football and we end up wearing Russell Athletic or some crap

All of this brings me back to the late 60's in UMd football history. For those of you too young to remember, Coach Edsall is not the first Terp coach to have team management issues.

From Wikipedia:
"...After he declined offers to pursue a professional playing career, Ward coached the game for 22 years. Most of that time was spent as an assistant coach and he served in that capacity at Maryland from 1952 to 1957,Oklahoma from 1957 to 1958, Iowa State from 1958 to 1965 and Army in 1966. At the United States Military Academy, Ward enjoyed the strictly regimented environment, and the players appreciated his aggressiveness.

In 1967, Ward returned to his alma mater to take the head coaching position. Before the season, 12 players failed to academically qualify to play on the team. During that first season, the team lost all nine of their games for the first time in the modern era. Ward's second year saw slight improvement, recording eight losses but with wins over North Carolina and South Carolina. However, many of his players were growing increasingly disgruntled with his coaching style.

In March 1969, Maryland athletic director Jim Kehoe called a meeting among 120 players, Ward, his assistants, and a three-man committee. Thirty-one players told Ward that they no longer wished to play on the team and accused him of using intimidation tactics that included verbal and physical abuse. Ward listened to the player's grievances, but did not respond at the time. Two days later, he resigned as head coach. Later that year, Sports Illustrated interviewed Ward, and he said:

"I won't go into all the specifics, but it wasn't the good players who started it. It was the guys who couldn't fight their way out of a paper bag, guys who sat on the bench and couldn't take it and a couple of pip-squeak cub newspaper guys who don't know what football's all about ... He gets on the campus newspaper and all of a sudden he's got power he never thought of having."

The Diamondback, the university's student newspaper, had criticized Ward for moving the team into one dormitory, which forced some other students out. Ward stated that the move was done on the advice of Kehoe—which Kehoe denied—and with the intent of focusing the players on their studies and building camaraderie. Ward and his assistants monitored the players' academic performance, enforced class attendance, and placed curfews on perceived troublemakers. Ward stated that, in his first year, only two of his players failed out of the school that he claimed had a history of poor athlete academics. He complained that he was a scapegoat and that there had been poor communication between him and Kehoe. Penn State head coach Joe Paterno was concerned with the situation surrounding Ward's resignation and sent a letter to the American Football Coaches Association demanding an investigation. Paterno said:

"I don't know who's right or wrong, but ... I don't think it's a good thing for a squad to fire a coach. As an association, we ought to know what happened. If a university fired an English professor because his class didn't like the way he was doing things, I know darn well that the American Association of University Professors would want to know what happened."

Maryland head coach Ralph Friedgen played as an offensive guard under Ward, and was one of the players who remained on the team when 40 of his teammates walked off in protest. Long after the events, Friedgen said "he was a tough coach ... If he had addressed some of the players' concerns, I don't know that so many would have left ... One of the things I learned from him was to surround myself with good assistants, and I don't know if he necessarily did that." Kehoe, who had been one of Ward's track coaches in college, said, "I think Bob's problem was that he expected his players to play and hustle the same way he had, and times had changed." After Maryland, Ward took a job as an assistant coach with the Ottawa Rough Riders of the Canadian Football League in 1969,[ and later coached for the Montreal Alouettes, from 1970 to 1971 and the Toronto Argonauts from 1975 to 1976. He remained in Canada for the remainder of his coaching career..."

Well, we should look at the bright side here:

Those on this message board who have been waiting for a reseating for season football ticket holders and those who hold the current decent seats...both may now get a chance to move.

Saban would be winning more but more importantly he'd be recruiting much better.