At Least They're Better Than Dana Dimel's Worst
Despite penalties and mistakes that made them rather resemble the John Blake teams at Oklahoma, the Coogs somehow managed to get themselves a lead for much of the second half tonight, only to give the game away in overtime.
I put this one on Art Briles.
With a 22-21 lead and lots of time in the game (about 9 minutes into the third quarter), he went for two points instead of kicking for the PAT.
The Coogs didn't succeed. They later scored to make it 29-21.
When Southern Miss scored a late touchdown, they went for two and were successful. The Coogs couldn't answer, and the game went to overtime. Southern Miss scores a TD. The Coogs don't. Nice.
One point was effectively the difference in the ball game.
I know that coaches have a little sheet that tells them when they should go for two or kick.
I wish someone would take that sheet and rip it to hell.
At the end of the game, it's one thing. But for the most part, I would rather see coaches take the point earlier in the game and put the pressure on the other coach late in the game.
How much nicer would it have been for Jeff Bower to be gripping over having to get an onside kick with a minute left because his team still trailed by the point Art Briles gave away?
Oh well. This team has one more win than Dana Dimel had in his worst season, and nobody can take that away from Coach Briles.
Otherwise, this season's just painful to watch.
And it's not all on Briles.
Dave Maggard ought to have his ass kicked for scheduling Oklahoma and Miami in the same season. Those were physical beatings this team couldn't handle, and the paychecks are a small consolation when you don't have enough players left to compete in a middle-of-the-road conference, and your fans are bailing because one-win teams really aren't that popular in this harshly judgmental sports town. Bill Yeoman can carry on all he wants about having to play great teams to be great, but Yeoman should be relegated to cheerleading in the athletics department and little else. He was a legendary coach, but this team and program CANNOT compete with Miami and OU at this point in time, and would be better served by rebuilding via the Bill Snyder method of nonconference scheduling than being humiliated and injured by national championship contenders.
This season is over for the Coogs, in early October. If that happens too many more times, it won't be long before I-A football in general is over at UH.
Rant complete. Go ahead, Coog Fans, and blister this season ticket holder with all the reasons you think I'm wrong. But do give me some reasons, and not just the pablum I've heard from Maggard and Yeoman about expecting great things.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 10/07/04 22:02 | Sports | Technorati
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This season has certainly been disheartening, to say the least. Particularly after last season brought hopes up. With the relative youth of our offense last year, it's almost surreal that we're having so much trouble getting going this year. I guess it goes to show how important Hadnot and the offensive line was to our success last year and that opposing coaches seem to have figured us out.
I really thought the only two things standing between us and a nine or ten win year was our schedule and a defensive line.
Though, truthfully, given the season we've had so far if I would have been told yesterday that we'd take Southern Miss into overtime, I'd have been satisfied with that (as opposed to our loss to Rice and getting blown out by Memphis again). We actually played them closer this year than last.
Silver Lining Hunting aside, though, I'm inclined to agree with your scheduling criticism with a couple caveats:
(1) I'd like to play at least one grade-A or big name program every year or every other year. Partially for the payout, partially to remind ourselves that we are actually in I-A, and partially for exposure. There's no reason to play two, though, until and unless we find ourselves at the top of our current conference and angling for BCS SOS.
(2) We're going to have more difficulty finding patsies than K-State. They have 5 non-BCS conferences to choose teams that they're (theoretically) better than in addition to I-AA. We've got some Sun Belt teams we can probably knock around and maybe a couple of WAC teams, but to have the kind of advantage that K-State has over it's opponents we'd probably need to schedule all I-AA opponents. That'd take us out of bowl contention unless we run the table in our conference (which, if we're doing that, we don't need to spend as much time playing Southeastern Louisiana and Sam Houston State. But luckily there is the Sun Belt, the Universities of Louisiana, and it would probably be a good idea to get to the point that we're dominating them before talking about higher ambitions.
Some pretty big caveats, I guess, which means that it depends on what you mean by a Snyder schedule as to whether or not I agree with you. If you were making the schedule, what would the three OOC games look like after this year?
At least after this year our in-conference schedule should get easier as we'll be in a division with similarly struggling programs, which gives us a chance to increase our record to improve recruiting.
Posted by R. Alex @ 10:15 on 10/08/04
Alex: Excellent points all. I was hoping for that, and not for rage from CoogFans folks. :)
In terms of 1) I don't have a problem with that. I think I would prefer a "name" program every two years. Schedule an LSU, or a Nebraska, or an OU, or a USC once every two years. Schedule one Big 12 or SEC opponent every year (in years when you don't have a perennial power, maybe you schedule an OSU or a Kansas or an Ole Miss -- still games that are tough for us, but winnable if we play a great game).
2) I need to elaborate on my Bill Snyder scheduling comment. When he started building the program at K-State, he scheduled a lot of opponents that he knew he could compete against -- I-AA teams and some bottom feeders in I-A. He got some wins, but he got some losses too; KSU was terrible then, but on the right track. But physically, he got teams in there he could compete against. I think it's shameful that he still plays many of those same teams, since K-State is a perennial Top 20 school now. The program is built. He needs to play better competition now, and drop the I-AA stuff.
But for UH, I think it's crucial we get some wins and build this city's fan base. I see all the old folks at Robertson, and few people my age or younger. We've had a generation of, frankly, sh!tty football with few wins. This town is kind of a crappy sports town, because we tend to follow winners and bail on losers. Houston is what it is, and we have lots of entertainment options. I just don't think UH can afford many more losing seasons and hope to have fans (and hence a program).
I wouldn't mind us scheduling one I-AA program per year for a few years. I don't think there was any shame in it when Snyder was building his program, and I don't think there's any shame in it considering how far UH has fallen from the glory years of twenty years ago. I'd like to see the rest of the non-con schedule most years with teams we can compete against. Teams that might range from Bowling Green to Boise State to Fresno State to Northern Illinois. Those programs have all gotten much better in recent years, and they certainly wouldn't be easy victories. But we'd be competitive, and I think we'd win our share without just taking the physical beating administered by teams like Miami and OU, who can go 2-3 deep with players of NFL potential at many positions.
I have no problems in taking pride in a bowl-eligible UH team that claims seven wins because one of them came against Sam Houston State or Texas State! We need to do some winning. As Briles recruits better athletes because of his high school connections, then we start to upgrade.
That's what I think, anyway. Unfortunately, nobody running around the AD offices on Cullen agrees. :)
Posted by Kevin @ 11:42 on 10/08/04
Kevin,
That's a very sensible plan that cleared up all the questions I had about the post in ways that I agree with.
I'd probably like to play at least one BCS team a year, though alternating between a powerhouse and a KU or Miss State would work for me - or even focusing on BCS teams that are down on their luck might be good. But that's quibbling and quite negotiable (not that you or I have any input, but it's fun to talk about).
The only part I don't quite understand is your second-to-last paragraph, though I think we agree there. I don't mind playing a Texas State to become bowl eligable, but of course Texas State doesn't help us become bowl eligable since it doesn't "count" bowl-wise. If we go 7-4 against TXST instead of 6-5 against LSU, I'm not sure how that would break down bowl-game wise (I'd say a draw, but I could be wrong), but at 6-5, every game needs to be a I-A opponent. Of course, if we can't win 5 games against I-A opponents in a weak C*USA West (assuming it stays weak, of course), we don't really deserve to be in a bowl game anyway so it's probably self-correcting.
In any case, I don't mind the idea of a I-AA game a year if it helps keep our record better. I was worried that you might be supporting more than that, which is where the bowl eligability issue really comes up.
I think the best answer is to play as many Sun Belt, WAC, MAC, and low-end MWC teams as will schedule us. That could be a problem, though, as a lot of them are taking up payout offers from larger programs and may not want to fit us in. Depends on how many low-end I-A teams have a similar philosophy.
But on the whole, I agree with with you.
Of course, there's a reason that I don't put in my two cents worth over at Coogfans :). It's a great source of information, but I live on a different planet than they do and my views are not particularly welcome there.
The Coogfans Satellite is a lot of fun, though, when they're not talking about politics.
Posted by R. Alex @ 14:17 on 10/08/04
Question from a different kind of cougar fan. I follow the BYU cougars and our head coach is deep in the muck this year. I see a few similarities between his situation and Dimel's.
Prior to Houston, Dimel showed such promise.
Just curious about your take on his coaching abilities. Did he coach the team into the ground with 0-11? Was the 5-7 followup no consolation at all? Was the program in shambles when he left?
I don't mean to drag up painful memories, but I would like your take on the answer to this question.
In 20/20 Hindsight, was it better to give Dimel one more year after 2001? Or would it have been better to let him go midseason back then?
Posted by BYU guy @ 11:43 on 10/14/04
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