At Least 3-4 Years Before RU Has A Winning Record

[Knight Shift]

This is not a major revelation--but some seem to be impatient this year--looking to assign blame to the players and/or the coaches for our record. Put aside issues of talent, the hole you know who left, the new coaching staff learning on the job, and the fact that we are in one of the two toughest divisions in P5 football. There are not many good examples in the Big 10, but there are quite a few good examples of PAC12 coaches who took over rebuild projects:

Gary Andersen at Oregon State:
He had success at Utah State and then Wisconsin 9-4 and 10-3 before electing to go to Oregon State:
2015: 2-10/ 0-9 in conference
2016: 2-7/ 1-5 -- many of their losses are fairly close.
Oddly, Andersen did not seem to have total rebuild--Mike Reilly (Nebraska's Coach) was there 2003-2014, but they were trending down, and they were 5-7 in Reilly's last year.

Mike MacIntyre- Colorado (@cubuffsdoug - please chime in with any info you have):
After 3 years at San Jose State, where he went 10-2 in his final year:
2013: 4-8/ 1-8
2014: 2-10/ 0-9
2015: 4-9/ 1-8
2016: 7-2 / 5-1 A breakthrough year?
MacIntyre reminds me a bit of Ash--spent most of his career as a defensive coach (but a few years in NFL), and 2 years as Duke DC before getting the San Jose State job.

Sonny Dykes- Cal
Dykes was HC at Louisiana Tech for 3 years, similar to MacIntyre, he had a 9-3 year in his final year before getting hired by Cal. Cal is similar to RU. They have tough academic standards that they apparently do not bend for athletes.

2013: 1-11/ 0-9
2014: 5-7/ 3-6
2015: 8-5/ 4-5
2016: 4-5/ 2-4--looks like Cal may wind up 4-8 or 5-7 this year--they have to face Stanford and WSU, who is on a tear right now.

Mike Leach- WSU
His story at Texas Tech is well-known. After sitting out for a few years, he moved to WSU:

2012: 3-9/ 1-8
2013: 6-7/ 4-5
2014: 3-9/ 2-7
2015: 9-4/ 6-3
2016: 7-2/ 6-0

Oddly, WSU's 2 losses this year were against non P5 teams, Eastern Washington and Boise State.

These teams/coaches are similarly situated to RU in that none of them are the big boys of the PAC-12 like USC, UCLA or Stanford.

I looked at the records of Jim Mora at UCLA, Rich Rodriguez at Arizona and Todd Graham at Arizona State. Mora and UCLA are not a good comparison to RU. Rich Rod and Graham were fairly well-established coaches before taking jobs with the PAC12. Graham has been 8-5, 10-4, 10-3, 6-7 and 5-4 in his four years at Arizona State. Rich Rod has been 8-5, 8-5, 10-4, 7-6 and 2-7 at Arizona, and it looks like he will probably be out after this year.

The one newer coach I left out was Chris Petersen because he is in a class by himself. Even Petersen was 8-6 and 7-6 with losing conference records in his first 2 years before raising the level at Washington this year.

Looking at the above, and our schedules, the following is realistic win totals, presuming Ash is still here in 2019. Wild cards are--- will Maryland become successful? Will Urban and Jim still be around? Does Franklin stay at PSU? Will Indiana continue to get better or remain a middling team?:

2016: 2-3 wins
2017: 3-6 wins (Eastern Mich, Morgan State, Illinois and Purdue should be winnable)
2018: 4-7 wins (Texas State, Kansas, Buffalo, Illinois should be winnable)
2019: Will it all click in year 4? We have Miami on the schedule. 2 More games out of conference games to be announced.

Can you handle this?

 

[BlockR]

I dont agree..by next season Staff has enough talent remaining,(and IF they keep class together) to win 5 games.If by year three end r this staff is winning 3 games ,they will no longer be here.
Season three should see a bowl game.

 

[Knight Shift]

I dont agree..by next season Staff has enough talent remaining,(and IF they keep class together) to win 5 games.If by year three end r this staff is winning 3 games ,they will no longer be here.
Season three should see a bowl game.

What don't you agree with?
I said next year 3-6 wins.
2018: 4-7 wins.
Not ready to pencil in wins against conference foes (excluding Illinois and Purdue).

 

[ArminRU]

I dont agree..by next season Staff has enough talent remaining,(and IF they keep class together) to win 5 games.If by year three end r this staff is winning 3 games ,they will no longer be here.
Season three should see a bowl game.

I personally think we'll be better next year, but I dunno about the enough talent remaining comment. It'll be from the infusion of new, young talent if anything.

 

[newwavedave1]

Hopefully a bowl in year 3 or 4. All depends on recruiting success. :pray:

 

[bac2therac]

Im glad you finally came around eyeore, I posed the question after game 1 is the fanbase prepared to deal with 2-3 more years of losing. Judging by this attendance this year, we should be down to just the diehards here pre 2005 again

 

[Knight Shift]

Im glad you finally came around eyeore, I posed the question after game 1 is the fanbase prepared to deal with 2-3 more years of losing. Judging by this attendance this year, we should be down to just the diehards here pre 2005 again

Not an eeyore- just looking at trends from PAC12 and extrapolating.
Can we get to 6 wins next year? Maybe, just maybe. I listen closely to Ash's post game pressers. He thinks we are "close," but notes that the margin for error in college football is slim. Next year, hopefully we have a healthy Martin, Hicks and Sneed at RB. We should be better at WR. Harris is weapon--not a major one, but a piece. Grant should be back. We'll see what Ahmir Mitchell can do. QB should be an upgrade from the first part of this year. The trenches shall be interesting.

So, if we are close this year according to Ash, maybe in year 2, some things will bounce our way. Maybe not.

We could flash in 2018. Time will tell.

Their loss if fans bail. One thing Hobbs and company better do is work on the game day experience if they don't want to lose fans. There are many aspects that are subpar and out of whack from policing to the video board and the team intro.

I'm not exactly a pre-2005 diehard, but we will hold on for a couple of bumpy years. While yesterday was disappointing--I am enjoying watching certain players grow and show some positive flashes.

 

[bac2therac]

next year is likely a 3-6 win season depending on how things break, obviously I think 4 or 5 are the most likely

2018 the schedule is very favorable early and that could be the opportunity we start to see a turnaround.

I fully agree the gameday stuff has clearly dropped compared to last year. You have to try your best to generate excitement with a struggling program and this year whoever is in charge failed bigly

 

[RURM85]

I'm hoping we can get to a bowl in year 3. Next year, current players second year in systems, looking for signs of improvement in play and at least 4 wins. If we're in year 4 and still floundering around - getting blown out by the big boys and losing to programs that recruit similarly to us (i.e. Purdue Indiana, Iowa, Illinois) and in some cases worse than us, that would be a bad sign. Most programs and fans don't have that level of tolerance. See Purdue.

We're not Indiana with Coach Wilson coming in and believing a complete turn around would take a decade. We're not a basketball school without any recruiting grounds in our local area.

 

[ScarletCrimson]

I miss Schiano.

 

[sct1111]

This is a reasonable assessment. We'll have a lot more weapons on offense next year. I think we score a lot more points next year. I'm more worried about our defense. How do our Dline and our linebackers get better? What about special teams? You have to imagine, Ash is trying to get a kicker and punter on board.

 

[RUnewjersey]

I'm hoping we can get to a bowl in year 3. Next year, current players second year in systems, looking for signs of improvement in play and at least 4 wins. If we're in year 4 and still floundering around - getting blown out by the big boys and losing to programs that recruit similarly to us (i.e. Purdue Indiana, Iowa, Illinois) and in some cases worse than us, that would be a bad sign. Most programs and fans don't have that level of tolerance. See Purdue.

We're not Indiana with Coach Wilson coming in and believing a complete turn around would take a decade. We're not a basketball school without any recruiting grounds in our local area.

No way Rutgers goes to a bowl in year 3 with this head coach. He and his staff have shown nothing this season.

 

[RURM85]

No way Rutgers goes to a bowl in year 3 with this head coach. He and his staff have shown nothing this season.

Thanks for enlightening me. No expectations this season as coaching staff completely ripped down everything prior and started new including culture, S&C, nutrition, systems/schemes, academic responsibilities, etc.

Plenty of coaches have had rough first years with new systems and made bowl games in years 2 or 3, including 2 coaches referenced in the OP, Dykes and Leach. It's not usually until the second season or third season that things start clicking with players in new systems.