Parallels Between Harbaugh & Michigan vs Ohio State and Mack Brown & Texas vs Oklahoma
I was looking into the records of Mack Brown @ Texas and Bob Stoops @ Oklahoma and came across a very interesting article written back in 2012.
It details Mack Brown's record against OU and Bob Stoops, the bad years (0-5 stretch), the good years (4-1 stretch) and then the downward trend again after those that 4-1 run.
You could just about replace all references to Mack Brown & Texas with Jim Harbaugh & Michigan, and Bob Stoops & Oklahoma with Urban Meyer & Ohio State, and you'd swear a lot of the article was just written yesterday (excluding the 4-1 run because that obviously hasn't happened for us yet). From the poor offensive showings, low point output, and the turnover-limiting risk averse game plans, garbage time scoring, etc. to the defense unable to defend "spread" offensive concepts, "tempo, crossing routes, zone read series, or much of anything else."
There's even a quip about over-aggressive defense: "[...] Texas was now consistently defending the Sooner offense as spread principles were promulgated throughout college football and we had defensive coordinators whose default answer to any adversity was not the blitz."
The article also covers some things that coincided with the turn in fortunes for Mack Brown & Texas noting a fundamental shift in offensive scheme with more aggressive game plans as well as a change in defensive scheme. Other things mentioned were how good the Texas teams were outside of the OU game, as they were winning at a .881 winning percentage...they just couldn't beat their primary rival which stood in the way of conference and national titles.
If you're feeling adventurous, read through the comments section after the article. From talks of "should Mack Brown be on the hot seat" to reports of poor pre-game hype for the team, etc. it's all just a clone of today's talks about Harbaugh.
It's like looking at ourselves in the mirror.
I just thought these were very interesting parallels between the two programs and head coaches and could provide some reassurance to those who wish we had stayed with the old offense from years past. Heck, it even looks like Ol' Don Brown might be changing his base defense to account for the severe weaknesses of pure man coverage against teams like OSU (based on the neck sharpie from today).
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:04 PM ^
Don Brown's defense has consistently adapted as necessary. They needed more reps to be comfortably proficient in the adaptation necessary against OSU, and we're there now. The limited nature of having to be a STUDENT athlete works that way sometimes. Witness our offense this year.
DB's a wizard and a dude and has deserved relatively little of the flack he's taken.
Harbaugh is better than Mack Brown. Our trajectory is way better, overall, than his Texas teams'. Apples and oranges. But, good to be reminded that the sky has not fallen, as is continuously asserted.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:18 PM ^
Just curious what makes you think Harbaugh is better than Mack Brown and that our trajectory is way better overall than his Texas teams?
Here's Mack's record for the first fives years for reference:
1998: 9-5, beat OU (not Bob Stoops though), bowl win (Cotton)
1999: 9-5, beat OU, bowl loss (Cotton)
2000: 9-5, lost to OU, bowl loss (Holiday)
2001: 11-2, lost to OU, bowl win (Holiday)
2002: 11-2, lost to OU, bowl win (Cotton)
Overall Record: 49 - 19, 3-2 bowl record
Harbaugh's record for the first five years:
2015: 10-3, lost to OSU, bowl win (Citrus)
2016: 10-3, lost to OSU, bowl loss (Orange)
2017: 8-5, lost to OSU, bowl loss (Outback)
2018: 10-3, lost to OSU, bowl loss (Peach)
2019: 5-2 (so far)
Overall Record: 43 - 16, 1-3 bowl record
They look pretty similar to me except we have no wins against our primary rival and a worse bowl record.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:58 PM ^
What a different era of college football. Miami and FSU on top. I remember them as being good. But KSU and Tenn?
October 23rd, 2019 at 3:02 PM ^
The last 5 years, Alabama, Clemson and OSU have clearly separated from the rest.
October 23rd, 2019 at 3:34 PM ^
Its all the coaches.
Saban, Swinney, and Meyer are the only multiple national championship coaches in the BCS/CFP era.
The teams the best coaches coach are going to be very good.
That said I'm surprised to see OU closer to Wisconsin than OSU. I guess OU really benefits from playing in a down Big XII.
October 25th, 2019 at 11:44 AM ^
Sure coaches are a big part of it, but it matters a lot what the circumstances around the program are like. Take these guys and put them at Stanford, Northwestern and Vandy (assuming these places don't have a corresponding huge cultural shift) and see how many NC they crank out.
October 23rd, 2019 at 3:29 PM ^
Bill Snyder had some teams back around the turn of the century.
He benefited from having Texas and OU in the Big XII South, but even so at that time Nebraska was still strong under Solich and Colorado wasn't terrible every year (Won the conference in 2001).
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:30 PM ^
1998: 9-5, beat OU (not Bob Stoops though), bowl win (Cotton)
1999: 9-5, beat OU, bowl loss (Cotton)
For the record, OU went 5-6 in 1998 and 7-5 in '99, so that's like the Luke Fickell OSU team. 2000 was when they made their big move.
October 24th, 2019 at 12:46 PM ^
Don Brown's defense still gets torched by spread offenses and running QBs. Usually offenses like Wisconsin's this year are good match up, but even then we got trampled.
If the defense can play like they did in the 2nd half of Penn State game against OSU, we have a shot. I was always jealous of how Mork's defense could stifle Urban's high powered offenses.
October 24th, 2019 at 3:35 PM ^
According to UFR Defense vs Penn State, sounds like it was more PSU's failure to execute than UM's D getting the job done.
October 24th, 2019 at 11:36 PM ^
The problem is that this isn’t Urban’s offense. It is Day’s.
has been for a couple of years.
October 24th, 2019 at 1:02 PM ^
dude the sky has already fallen
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:27 PM ^
While I agree it is not written in stone that OSU will continue to beat us every year from now, let us also not forget that a little some one named Vince Young was a major reason that rivalry turned. He was one of the greatest college players of all time. While we would all love for a similar turnaround to happen here, there is also no guarantee a generational player like Vince Young is walking through that doorway to help turn that tide.
October 23rd, 2019 at 8:48 PM ^
Yeah, I'll indulge this comparison if JJ turns out to be as transcendent as VY.
Otherwise, nah.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:41 PM ^
So, is Jim Harbaugh, Dabo Sweeney or Mack Brown now?
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:42 PM ^
Like I'm lookin' in the mirror.
October 23rd, 2019 at 3:44 PM ^
Thank you for doing this. I said in another recent thread -- in response to someone praising Mack Brown's record -- that it's good Texas didn't fire Mack Brown after years 5, 6, or even 7 after he failed to win his conference to that point, and had lost to Stoops five straight times with every loss by double digits and two of those by 49+ points.
It's funny how a run of success in subsequent years made people forget what came before it.
October 23rd, 2019 at 3:58 PM ^
I remember looking at those Red River Beatdowns. Hoo boy.
October 23rd, 2019 at 4:04 PM ^
I always saw Mack Brown as as a Lloyd Carr clone, doing less with more.
Both won 1 national title, but had teams stacked with NFL talent every year, but both only had that 1 incredible year when led by generational talents.
Woodson for UM
VY for Texas
This is a totally different era and I don’t want to jump on the HArbaugh apologist train, but if you think he’s coaching and recruiting on an even playing field, you’re not being intellectually honest about what’s been going on since the BCS and now even more extreme with the playoff era.
We all know the stories about recruiting bagmen and how hard it has been for UM to pull in guys like Gary and Dax..barely hanging on at the end. OSU, Clemson, Bama, don’t seem to lose players to Ole Miss last minute.
Regarding practice, our boys are still required to go to class, and time on task matters. Every hour in the classroom is an hour away from Schembechler hall, the film room, weight room, and athletic trainers.
Harbaugh-Mack Brown isn’t the best comparison for me. Lloyd-Mack is actually much more accurate given how much NFL talent both squandered.
I think Harbaugh is just in a tough spot trying to navigate the shifting paradigm of high revenue college sports, and what it means to be a student athlete these days in college football and basketball. Beilein left for a reason, and basically told the world that it wasn’t an equal playing field, despite all his success at UM.
Not to mention Harbaugh jumped right into the B1G East, when MSU was in their golden era of Mork, PSU was “healing” and started pulling in 5 stars, and OSU upgraded from an elite coach (Tressel) to a generational coach Meyer- all while playing by the SEC “rule book”
October 23rd, 2019 at 6:00 PM ^
This is a good take on the situation. 6 damn inches and Harbaugh would be 1-3 against OSU, 1 BTCG appearance and probably a BT championship and a playoff appearance. This would completely change the narrative.
Throw in MD completing a wide open two point conversion and Harbaugh might have 2 BT championships already.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:46 PM ^
Beilein left for a reason, and basically told the world that it wasn’t an equal playing field, despite all his success at UM.
Insiders have said that this really wasn't it - while he had some frustrations with recruiting and one-and-dones, that's not what really caused him to leave. He was just attracted to the possibility of coaching at the highest level.
October 24th, 2019 at 11:45 PM ^
It is a tired claim that those schools have bagmen and that is why we lose recruits.
If we are truthful, we will admit that talented kids want to play for Meyer, Saban, Dabo. They want to play for coaches that win...I can’t blame them.
we may have lost some to the bagmen of Mississippi State....but to claim that we are equals to Clemson, Bama and aOSU, except we play by the rules is silly...unless you have some proof, I am going to believe that Dabo, Saban and Meyer are amazing coaches (and Assholes because they aren’t ours)...
watch Meyer on the B1G analysis and tell me he doesn’t know his shit.
October 25th, 2019 at 11:56 AM ^
Sure, talented kids do want to play for Meyer, Saban and Dabo because they win. The question becomes how did those coaches build their winning programs?
October 25th, 2019 at 12:46 PM ^
Combination of circumstances, luck, and being better coaches.
Again, if OSU had been called short on 4th down, our past and future trajectory looks a hell of a lot better.
And if Meyer had this roster and schedule, his team would probably be undefeated so far.
October 25th, 2019 at 12:41 PM ^
you are partially right, winning helps but I will point out after going 7-6, nick saban then got the number 1 recruiting class that included julio jones and a few other grown men, that played/still play on Sunday, if you think them kids saw the potential in nick after a 7-6 year, or the one chip he won at LSU, then I have some ocean front property for you to buy in beautiful idaho. All the big time coaches are good dont get that twisted, with the exception of Dabo, hes more of a ceo type, he knew he needed a team around him to prop him up, and he would go get the talent. But these teams rose up off the money sign bags they dropped in certain kids laps, or doing favors for kids to get them to come to their school. You think kids were forgoing a chance to go to a florida school to come up to cold columbus because that Urban guy is just a swell guy ???
October 25th, 2019 at 2:37 PM ^
Edit: this is a response to FrankTigers2.
I'm sorry, but are you kidding me? There's been so much proof already brought forth on this website. Jim Hackett - as AD at the time! - basically came out and said that they were trying to pay Rashan Gary a lot of money to go to Clemson. This has been confirmed by Bacon's book (not the school, but the fact that something like this happened). Seth I believe confirmed that Isaiah Wilson was literally committed to us until Georgia offered him something like $400K to sign.
I don't doubt that obviously some kids want to play for these programs, but to claim that we aren't losing incremental 4 and 5-star players to these programs because of their rampant cheating ignores the mountains of data that we already have.
Anyone who thinks Harbaugh is competing on a level playing field is deluding themselves. Our program is hurt as a result of others cheating. It's not an opinion or a judgment statement, it's a fact.
October 23rd, 2019 at 6:08 PM ^
Ok but here's the thing...JH teams are ill prepared emotionally and schematically in every road game vs ranked opponents. We always see constant goofiness and mistakes out of our guys rhat scream lack of attention to detail. He is NOT getting the best out of the talent he had and his judgement is questionable in NUMEROUS situations.
There is something wrong with his game prep approach...dunno what it is...I strongly suspect this may be part of the reason Mattison left.
October 23rd, 2019 at 6:47 PM ^
That’s one of the parallels between Mack Brown and Harbaugh and an issue Texas teams faced which is talked about in the article as well as in the comments section by Texas fans.
October 23rd, 2019 at 8:23 PM ^
I still think that the better comparison might be Osborne's Nebraska vs. Switzer's Oklahoma...although Osborne could win a big intersectional game every once in awhile in the 70's and 80's provided he wan't playing a team from Florida.
October 23rd, 2019 at 9:57 PM ^
Mack Brown also signed the #1 recruit in the nation in Vince Young in 2003. We have nobody like that, sorry.
October 24th, 2019 at 10:36 AM ^
I see these as more comparisons between programs than coaches.
How does a program get by a superiorly perceived rival in it's own division/conference?
Wow and a patient fan base seems to be the common denominator, that might be the problem here.
October 24th, 2019 at 10:59 AM ^
That is a great point! I have said the same thing to many. Harbaugh could have 2 division titles that were basically out of his control. The 1/4 inch ball placement and the Maryland arm punt.
it is crazy and one could argue that one shouldn’t rely on luck.. but damn.. Ohio State has a national title based on one controversial call at the end ... and a few other lucky breaks along the way.
when was the last time they actually lost a game on a controversial call or fluke play at the end... like NEVER. And they have been in many close games in the last two decades with a good share of last minute controversy.
October 24th, 2019 at 12:54 PM ^
So true. The wife and I laughed at the beginning of the osu/nw game. No time had even run off the clock and they already gained 5 yards (penalty). It's been that way for them for decades.
October 24th, 2019 at 12:55 PM ^
Double
October 24th, 2019 at 4:04 PM ^
Michigan may need a generational talent at QB like Vince Young to beat OSU.
October 25th, 2019 at 12:45 PM ^
its funny i was saying this on another forum, but the one thing I will point out also is keep this in mind Texas has won the big12, 7 times in their school history, but when we think of football powerhouses texas was one of them, so this speaks more to mack was good and also caught a once in generational talent in Vince, and Colt was nothing to sneeze at either. So my point is to temper expectations and ride with the decent coach he may get lucky and get that game changer athlete
October 27th, 2019 at 1:43 PM ^
Texas has won the big12, 7 times in their school history,
The Big 12 was founded in the mid-1990s. Before then Texas was in the Southwest Conference.
Comments