[NU Sports] Questions

[cherron604 at aol.com]

1 - Quarterbacks
 
Everybody involved in the program has known for 2 or three years that BB was not going to be around in 2006.  If the expectation was to continue to play a very quarterback-centric offense, shouldn't the expectation have been that the pipeline would contain as many strong QB candidates (with real solid credentials) as possible ?  Yet all we had in the pipeline for 2006 was Bacher, Kafka and Brewer.  Should we have made the calculation a few years ago that, since this offense requires such a high-level of QB skill, if we could not maintain that skill level in the recruiting pipeline, we should move to a more typical Big-Ten type offense that was less dependent on highly-skilled (hard to find) quarterbacks...?  Is it as simple as saying spread offense=lots of QB talent=lots of talented QB recruits, or, if you can't bring those recruits in, migrate toward a more typical offense ?
 
2 - Offensive Coordinators
 
Kevin Wilson took over as OC in 1999 with 9 years head coach or OC experience.  He had great success for 3 years, then left, not for a head coaching job, but to be OC at Oklahoma (where he remains).  In 2002 Mike Dunbar took over as OC with 17 years head coach or OC experience.  He had a great run for 4 years before leaving for another lateral move (OC at Cal).  Now we have promoted an OC with no head coaching or OC experience.  This raises a couple of questions:
 
a) Why have 2 very accomplished OC's left the program, since they were not leaving to become head coaches ?  Was it money ?  If it was purely money, does the university need to review the pay for the assistant coaches ?  Or did they leave for some other reason ?  If we are not going to pay adequately to retain good OC talent, do we have to reconsider our commitment to playing football at the Big Ten level ?
 
b) Isn't it safe to assume that the offense we have been using requires exceptional OC talent as well as exceptional QB talent ?  We might further assume that exceptional OC talent is at least as hard to find as (if not harder to find than) excepional QB talent.  Given both of these, should a calculation have been made that unless the supply of exceptional OC talent could be maintained and guaranteed, we might need to transition to a more standard offense, not requiring such exceptional OC talent to implement ?
 
c) Is it reasonable to assume that you could replace two OC's with a combined 26 years of head coach or OC experience prior to their arrival with an OC with no head coach or OC experience ?  Why exactly did we think we needed to be an OC training ground when for the last seven years we had been more of a finishing school for highly-experienced, highly-talented OC's ?  Did we even consider hiring anybody with HC or OC experience when Dunbar left ?  
 
Garrick McGee is probably a great guy, and he might be a good OC someday, but why exactly did we determine that he should get his on-the-job training here ?  Shouldn't that training happen at some place like Toledo or Western Illinois ? 
 
Greg Colby is another issue entirely, to be discussed separately.
 
Chuck Herron   Tech '85
 
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