[NU Sports] OSU game highlighted Randy Walker's shortcomings

[Jeff Beamsley]

I don't agree with the "poor Northwestern" excuse for mediocrity.

I also don't agree that high academic standards and winning football are
mutually exclusive.  The only way to overcome self-limiting low expectations
is to stop making excuses for poor results and demand good results.

Finally, I would be interested to hear from anyone that has specific
knowledge of the athletic budget.  I suspect that the football team is doing
fine financially because of the revenue sharing agreements in the BT and the
broadcast rights in a big media market.  The football team may not support
the rest of the athletic department as robustly as it does at UoM of OSU,
but I'll bet that it is a net positive contributor.

Bienen knows that the only way he is going to be able to continue to be one
of the most expensive institutions in the country is to provide the complete
undergraduate experience.  That includes a competitive football team.
Murphy is here to help raise funds and make sure that our marquee programs
(Football and Basketball) continue to make progress.  NU still has to win
one more game to guarantee a winning (won more than you lost) season, but if
that happens, it represents obvious progress.

I'm not a big fan of Walker's approach either, but he has delivered results
under difficult circumstances.  Baz will be a big loss, but otherwise, this
is a very young team that may only need three BT wins to post a winning
record again next year.  

My football expectations for NU are that we post a winning record every year
(which gets us into bowl games), and content for the BT title (and more) in
those years where we have a lot of seniors starting (particularly at QB).  

Jeff






-----Original Message-----
From: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com [mailto:nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com] On
Behalf Of Hakirsch at aol.com
Sent: Wednesday, November 16, 2005 8:30 AM
To: johnadeg at bellatlantic.net; nwu-sports at tssi.com
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] OSU game highlighted Randy Walker's shortcomings

Well I am sure John's note will elicit a lot of responses including mine.

A few thoughts--

Walker is not a player's coach --and I am not sure how much any school wants
a player's coach--particularly with the NU football player, who on average
is more intelligent than the average NCAA football player. They probably
more than others understand that not everyone is goinhg to love his coach.  

I think John is right that Walker and NU had had a lot of luck the past
several years-(Mich 2000, Iowa 2005,OSU 2004 to name a few) and with a few
plays going the other way we could easily have been  at 4-7 some of the bowl
years under Walker.  While some games have gone the other way, (PSU 2005
quickly comes to mind), it seems with have had more of the former than the
latter. 

Yes our defense and special teams have been our weak spots under Walker and
of course it would be great to improve there.  But one has to look at our
overall record and graduation rates as being the key measurement of his
success or not--and as  has been hashed about before, Walker passes here.

It would be great to go to a good name bowl every year, but I am skepitcal
if that is an acheivable goal.  It is a worthy goal , but extraordinary
tough when if you don't finish in the top 3 or 4 in the conference it won't
happen. 
When you have OSU , Mich and PSU in the conference it is tough to
consistently surpass Minn, Wisc, and Iowa And the recent also rans of MSU,
Ill and Purdue do not sit quietly.  On top of that would we as alums feel
good, that in order to acheive the lofty goal, we probably would have to
spend a ton of money on a football coach and staff  salaries?  I for one
think it would send the wrong message about what NU is about --academics
first.


In short , yes on average we will be in the middle of the pack under Walker-
or probably any coach (remember if they get good they leave for more money
or more opportunity to win big --ala Ara, Agase and,Barnett-) but this
should allow us to go to a name bowl every few years and a lesser name bowl
in others-I can be happy with that- (Maybe I am biased because i was at NU
in the late 70's early 80's when going -1-10 and 0-11 and getting blown out
every game by half time was the norm-)

-Now if we could only make the NCAA's in hoops ... 

Harry


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