Updated best hires in the off-season so far?

Submitted by OccaM on

What do you all think?

My top 5 would be: 

1. Chad Morris SMU 

2. Will Muschamp Auburn 

3. Pat Narduzzi Pitt 

4. Gary Andersen Oregon State

5. David Beaty Kansas 

Paul Chryst seems very Hokish to me for Wisconsin, so I left him off for now. I really believe Nebraska could have done better than Riley. Chad Morris saved Dabo's career at Clemson and is young enough to resurrect SMU football at the perfect time if the B12 is looking to expand again. Muschamp's defense with that Auburn offense? Yeah, that sounds terrifying. Narduzzi should help that Pitt defense out big time in the weaker ACC Coastal division. Oregon State getting Andersen is a coup, and Beaty did work with wide receivers at A&M. I'm skeptical of McElwain to Florida b/c I believe a lot of his success at CSU this year was predicated on transfers like Dee Hart. Before them he's meh not to mention the $5 million eventual buy-out. 

Edit: Completely forgot about Herman at Houston. I would put him at 3 with Narduzzi b/c you don't know whether it's all him or Meyer at OSU like how you don't know whether it's Narduzzi or Dantonio at MSU. 

Edit 2: Forgot about Leipold also, but he's going to Buffalo from a D3 team so there he's got work to do to get on the radar of P5 teams. Pelini at YSU just seems like a stop gap and Stitt at Montana parallels Leipold imo except from a D2 school. 

Picktown GoBlue

December 25th, 2014 at 2:22 PM ^

should be interesting at Buffalo, but I agree it would be questionable at this point to put him in the top 5.  But you never know.  What he's done in D3 is pretty amazing.  Only one of his 8 seasons didn't go to 15 games.  6 national championships, 1 runner-up.  Fastest coach to ever get to 100 wins, breaking a record from 1921.  And doing all this while Mount Union has been such a powerhouse as well.  It'll be a new game in D1, in the MAC, with different challenges in recruiting and all, so will be fun to watch.

Couzen Rick's

December 25th, 2014 at 5:48 PM ^

It's Oregon State w/ Gary Andersen. Mike Riley was arguably the most successful coach in school history, as mundane as his record may have seemed at first glance. the fact they were somehow able to poach GA from Wisconsin is utterly mind-boggling and is the shot in the arm that program needed. (I'm a native Oregonian, so I have a bit of an expanded knowledge regarding all things Oregon)