Now that the coaching search is over, I guess I'll be looking for a few things to judge the success or failure of the Ash era. Personally I'm enthusiastic about the hire, although if a BIG name was really in play, you can't help but be a bit disappointed.
For a program such as ours, I think the way to the top is much more likely to be through incremental improvements (like Michigan State) rather than a massive jump. A BIG fish (not Narduzzi, but a Mullen, Miles, or some of the other names speculated) can allow you to skip ahead and make a jump up the ladder, as you can instantly recruit better talent and also your coaching is at a very high level. For most programs, however, you need to make smart coaching decisions, which allows better on the field play, leading to more wins, to better recruiting, and so on. Ash strikes me as a very sensible and sound hire, so what should we look for in terms of whether things are going in the right direction?
Pre-Signing Day: How does he handle the news conference...is he a guy that will win over the room and fan base from Day One. More importantly, we should find out how much sizzle he does or doesn't have on the recruiting trail pretty quickly. Do we see guys like Pollock and Sneed and Manning and Russo and others re-affirm their commitments? Can he pull in a few big fish like a Fuller, where he has a relationship already? Does he create any buzz or is it pretty ho-hum?
Staff: The biggest question would seem to be offensive coordinator. What style offense is he looking to run? Obviously he was with Bielema, with the run heavy pro-style, and also with Meyer, with a run-heavy spread. Will be interesting to see what caliber staff he can assemble.
Year One: I don't have massive expectations for next year, but what I want to see is a defense that is much more fundamentally sound and a hell of a lot harder to play against. Other than at linebacker, he has a lot of players returning, so you would think that we should see a better defense. Whether that translates to many more wins is hard to know, but I will be disappointed if the defense doesn't look better and isn't statistically much more improved.
We will also learn more about him as a recruiter with the Class of 2017. The Class of 2016 is largely in the books (I'd expect a few new names, but likely 70% of the class is known at this point), but does he recruit a different type of player? Can he make in-roads with the top NJ kids? Does he look at the midwest more where he presumably has more relationships recruiting for Ohio State?
Year Two is when I think we will really learn what we have. Two years to put in his system, still a pretty sound defense (should still have most of the secondary and defensive line), an opportunity to establish and identity on offense, presumably stability with the assistant coaches. This is the year you would like to see things get better from a wins-losses perspective.
The thing that excites me is that he takes pride in being a student of the game. He seems open to learning and adapting, so I hope we aren't sitting around in a few years complaining that our coaches are too stubborn. We need to get back to being a fundamentally sound football team and I think/hope this is the guy to do it.
For a program such as ours, I think the way to the top is much more likely to be through incremental improvements (like Michigan State) rather than a massive jump. A BIG fish (not Narduzzi, but a Mullen, Miles, or some of the other names speculated) can allow you to skip ahead and make a jump up the ladder, as you can instantly recruit better talent and also your coaching is at a very high level. For most programs, however, you need to make smart coaching decisions, which allows better on the field play, leading to more wins, to better recruiting, and so on. Ash strikes me as a very sensible and sound hire, so what should we look for in terms of whether things are going in the right direction?
Pre-Signing Day: How does he handle the news conference...is he a guy that will win over the room and fan base from Day One. More importantly, we should find out how much sizzle he does or doesn't have on the recruiting trail pretty quickly. Do we see guys like Pollock and Sneed and Manning and Russo and others re-affirm their commitments? Can he pull in a few big fish like a Fuller, where he has a relationship already? Does he create any buzz or is it pretty ho-hum?
Staff: The biggest question would seem to be offensive coordinator. What style offense is he looking to run? Obviously he was with Bielema, with the run heavy pro-style, and also with Meyer, with a run-heavy spread. Will be interesting to see what caliber staff he can assemble.
Year One: I don't have massive expectations for next year, but what I want to see is a defense that is much more fundamentally sound and a hell of a lot harder to play against. Other than at linebacker, he has a lot of players returning, so you would think that we should see a better defense. Whether that translates to many more wins is hard to know, but I will be disappointed if the defense doesn't look better and isn't statistically much more improved.
We will also learn more about him as a recruiter with the Class of 2017. The Class of 2016 is largely in the books (I'd expect a few new names, but likely 70% of the class is known at this point), but does he recruit a different type of player? Can he make in-roads with the top NJ kids? Does he look at the midwest more where he presumably has more relationships recruiting for Ohio State?
Year Two is when I think we will really learn what we have. Two years to put in his system, still a pretty sound defense (should still have most of the secondary and defensive line), an opportunity to establish and identity on offense, presumably stability with the assistant coaches. This is the year you would like to see things get better from a wins-losses perspective.
The thing that excites me is that he takes pride in being a student of the game. He seems open to learning and adapting, so I hope we aren't sitting around in a few years complaining that our coaches are too stubborn. We need to get back to being a fundamentally sound football team and I think/hope this is the guy to do it.
