Oh man, this is an Insider article, which means they only list the top choice and then you have to pay to see the rest of the article. And crap, they teased this with a picture of Mark Richt, which means there's no way I'd... oh wait...
1. Justin Fuente, Virginia Tech
Fuente faced a much taller hill to climb at Memphis than he does at Virginia Tech. Frank Beamer does not leave Virginia Tech devoid of talent on either side of the ball. It would not at all be surprising to see the Hokies compete for -– or win -– the ACC Coastal in 2016.
This job, and Blacksburg, Virginia, is a tailor fit for the 39-year-old Fuente, known by friends and colleagues as a bit of an introvert.
Athletic director Whit Babcock moved nimbly during the middle of the regular season to secure one of the top mid-major prospects. Fuente and Babcock's work in convincing veteran defensive coordinator Bud Foster to stay is icing. This was by far the best work done during the cycle; Babcock got in, got out -– and got his guy.
Comments
And a solid plus? Bronco Mendenhall is 8th.
that's still top 3rd so I wouldn't scoff at it. If they were closer to 18 or 20 I would giggle with joy. Unfortunately, I think UVA upgraded significantly and that irritates me. A Lot. I was really hoping they would continue their long glorious spiral into irrelevance. That was too much to ask for, apparently.
Not to worry. Sooner (we hope) or later, the rot of entitlement will set in and infect even ole Bronco. It's as much a part of loluva football as coming late and leaving early. I think it's in the water.
FTFY
I mean, I agree that he is an improvement, but who wouldn't have been? Mike London made basic coaching errors regularly. However, he fit in with the culture at UVA, and recruited better than I think Mendenhall will. Maybe I'm bias and wrong but I seriously believe that UVA did not elevate their program above a 5 win team with this hire.
Mendenhall recruited some studs to BYU. Now that he can recruit more than Mormons I have a feeling that he is going to do quite well. I'm happy that the ACC Coastal is going to be one of the most competitive division in all of CFB for years to come, but I wish that UVA would have hired more ineptly. Apparently they are tired of all the shellackings. Who knew?
They could have done a whole lot worse. Bronco gives them a guy who's won at the 1-A level and has a whiff of credibility. I would have been completely terrified if they hired Richt. Instead I'm just somewhat disturbed.
Meh... 6-14 at BYU against ranked opponents, 3 of those wins in 2009
I don't really see that being much of an improvement over London, to be honest.
Jim Rome is jealous of the heat on that take.
Jim Rome wears Alum07 pajamas
Check that...
Quality.
6-14 against ranked opponents? For a team full of married white guys? That's probably pretty freaking amazing.
So what exactly is the difference between a team full of married white guys (BYU) and a team full of softies (LOLUVA)?
Well, the first difference that comes to mind is that the married white guys don't drink, but the softies only drink zima.
I'm confused...I thought you were talking about differences...not similarities
The married white guys look forward to getting away from their nagging wives for 3 hours on Saturday. The UVA softies are pissed they have to put down the XBox controller for 3 hours on Saturday.
Has London ever beaten a ranked team? Hard to say this isn't an improvement. Tough to say how good of a hire this is, since Bronco's ability to recruit is limited by the university. I don't think it's a home run hire, but I do think it's a top 10 head coach hire from this (off)season.
To be fair, he beat two in 2011 (GT & FSU). But we of course know how that last game against a ranked opponent ended up for him.
I tried to find the David Wilson set-up stiff arm on Mosley gif but couldn't find it. SOMONE FIND IT!
This One?
Beamer didn't have a great record against ranked opponents either, and i'm talking about in his prime.
You're right, but
Beamer and VT were 21-20 between 2005 and 2015 (same time that Bronco was at BYU).
Sliding back a few years, into the prime, we get 25-16 between 1999 and 2009.
Still over .500, and better than Bronco.
Come on. Are we really going to defend just over .500?
At a certain point we should just admit that this wasn't a bright spot.
slightly over .500 is still a lot better than .300
They're both not very good.
This is the comment you replied to
this was your reply:
slightly over .500 is still better than .300. I don't understand why you're insistent on pointing out that it's not very good. The original comment was that it's better than the .300 mark Bronco accomplished.
Who cares if .500 isn't as good as the 1.000 that I'm certain all of the SEC schools have accomplished (don't have time to fact check)? .500 is in fact better than .300. Just accept that and move on.
Because THIS is the comment that started this strand:
Beamer didn't have a great record against ranked opponents either, and i'm talking about in his prime.
What I think he's saying is that you can't so much bash Mendenhall on that, particularly since he's still an active coach. Even in Beamer's peak years he was close to .500 against ranked teams.
I'm guessing you missed this comment, then
In Beamer's "peak years" he was .610 which is pretty darn good and definitely a heck of a lot better than .300.
I think we're all getting caught up on silly, trivial details. Beamer was better than Mendenhall against ranked opponents. The reality is that it's hard to beat ranked opponents. That's why they're ranked. There are only like 12 active coaches right now who have better than .500 records against ranked opponents and around half of those coaches have coached Championship winning teams.
I don't think win percentage against ranked teams is an accurate metric to use when comparing coaches and it's kind of silly to compare Mendenhall to Beamer since the two will never coach against each other. I think the original point of identifying his record against ranked opponents was that despite the fact BYU has done well in his tenure against mediocre competition he struggled when he had to coach against good teams.
I think the original point of identifying his record against ranked opponents was that despite the fact BYU has done well in his tenure against mediocre competition he struggled when he had to coach against good teams.
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And the counterpoint was that the exact same argument has been used against Beamer. The perception was that he couldn't "win the big game".
I guess it turns out that the stats are on Beamer's side with regard to beating ranked teams.
So this is from last year, but here is the list as of 2014 of P5+ND coaches who have don't have a losing record all-time and at their current (in 2014) school:
Nick Saban, 50-35 All time, 28-12 at Alabama
Gus Malzahn, 5-3 All time, 5-2 at Auburn
Jimbo Fisher, 9-5 All time and at FSU
Mark Richt, 34-31 All time and at UGA
Les Miles, 40-31 All time, 37-19 at LSU
Brian Kelly, 15-11 All time, 7-7 at Notre Dame
Urban Meyer, 25-12 All time, 5-2 at OSU
Bob Stoops, 50-23 All time and at OU
Mark Helfrich, 2-1 All time and at Oregon
Steve Spurrier, 65-52-1 All time, 18-23 at USCe
David Shaw, 14-4 All time and at Stanford
Gary Patterson, 14-14 All time and at TCU
Kevin Sumlin, 8-7 All time and 5-6 at aTm,
Jim More, 5-5 All time and at UCLA
Chris Petersen, 8-4 All time, 0-0 at Washington
Frank Beamer, 43-50-1 All time
15/65 coaches don't have a losing record against ranked teams as of last year. I'm sure that's changed this year, but that just shows how difficult it is to beat ranked teams.
Yea just glancing through that list shows that several of those coaches now have .500 or losing records against ranked teams now.
From that list, Malzahn now has a losing record at 9-10, Sumlin is 12-12, and Petersen is 10-12.
Teams are ranked for a reason. Theoretically, a ranked team only has (ranking-1) potential teams who could beat them and they're not likely to play more than 3 or 4 of them in a season. It would take way too much time to figure out, probably, but how many of those wins over ranked teams were wins by the higher ranked team over a lower ranked team? I think another thing you'll notice about that list is that they've all coached ranked teams and a bunch of them have won Championships. That's a list of really really good coaches.
Exactly. Those coaches are some of the best coaches, except for those whose resume is very small at the moment. A lot of those coaches also inherited teams with historical success. Beamer inherited a team with little history. Up until we went to a bowl game in the 93 season, Beamer was 2-17-1 versus ranked teams. Beamer's record vs ranked teams since 93 is 43-36.
That was like a few years ago when VT had a 1-24 record against Top 5 teams. Can't remember when it was. But that was such a stupid stat. It's extremely hard to have any kind of decent record against Top 5 teams.
It's all relative.
You'd think that only top 5 teams have decent records against top 5 teams. Any team who hasn't been there much (or isn't in a division where they face these teams much) is going to have a bad record there.
But if you're a top 25 team regularly, you expect the "beating ranked teams" stat to get better.
For context (somewhat outdated at 2010 only), here are the records for FBS teams vs. top-10 competition:
https://sites.google.com/site/collegefootballhistory/record-vs-top-10-te...
Spoiler alert: only USCw has a record over .500.
OK, now go back and try that for "ranked teams".
You're pretty damned good if you're .500 all time against top 10 teams.
Edit: What I think is interesting is that most of the teams at the top have played a lot more games against top-rated competition.
But if you want "sad", UVa is beating VT in this stat, at 16% vs 15%.
That list is already linked above in the WSJ article. 50/65 P5 head coaches have a losing record against top-25 competition. That's pretty universal.
That stat was for coaches. I'd be curious what it would look like for teams.
Only one team had a better than .500 record against top 10 teams. I'd expect higher for top 25 teams. I'd also expect higher for teams if you just looked at their "peak" years.
Yes, it's very difficult to beat the top teams.
I'm not sure what point you're trying to make, but you're getting a bit obnoxious right now. So here's this which is up to 2009. I can't find anything more recent. As of 2009, 8 teams had a better than .500 record versus ranked teams. Those teams were OU, OSU, USCw, Michigan, Notre Dame, Texas, Alabama, and Florida State. All of those teams had played over 250 games against ranked teams. At the time, this was before our recent slide, we were 46-86-1 (.34962) against ranked teams which was 22nd overall. That's less than half of what those top guys had played.
I find these numbers pretty interesting. I'm pleasantly surprised. I didn't realize VT would be so high on the "ranked teams list". VT's record against ranked teams is more impressive that I realized.
At the same time, VT's record against top 10 teams continues to be pretty bad.
I think what it shows is that VT made significant strides with respect to the top 25, but didn't budge the stats much with respect to the top 10.
Oh, and my apologies. I didn't mean to be irritating.
From '87 to '93, VT was 1-14 against Top 10 teams. From then until the present time, we are 7-20 against top 10 teams. .35 against top 10 teams is over the course of 23 seasons is still respectable.
I guess it's all relative to expectations.
Richt just got fired from Georgia with a .522 record against ranked teams, and a .370 record against top 10 teams.
Yes, but that's looking at things in a vacuum. Many of those ranked and top 10 teams were annual matchups against SEC opponents often times. While this is not exactly the case, if a coach posted a .522 record against conference opponents and failed to win a conference championship in 10 years, wouldn't you argue that you need to try something new? Mark Richt is not a bad coach, but he'd hit his ceiling at UGA. They needed an SEC Championship at least and he couldn't provide, even though he was about 5 yards from one just a few years ago.
Good point. It will be interesting to see if the strategy pays off.
By the way, Richt was .458 against ranked SEC opponents.
Don't forget the preseason pole bias toward SEC schools. This is all based on where a teams is ranked when you play them, not at the end of the season. Just look at all the SEC teams that were ranked pre-season, but are not ranked now. Every season they seem to have 4 more teams ranked pre-season than they do at the end, as all the mid-level 2 loss teams move up.
That's a great point, and certainly helps with the "top 10" sorts of records.
It doesn't irritate me, not with the confidence I have in Fuente and Foster. What would irritate me is if we built an all-facets monster team, and then had to deal with SoS questions every year because Miami, UNC, and UVA were steaming piles of Bronco droppings. I'm glad that every team in the Coastal except Georgia Tech now has a solid coach, and we got the hottest one of all.
I agree. Can you imagine the universe where coastal division matchups got the attention of say clemson fsu or ANY sec game? Im hoping we can start seeing some numbers regularly behind the team names in our division so I can hear hype rather than what a train wreck the coastal is.
I remember the days when VT-Miami was a big deal. Both teams would have those little numbers next to their names, though I'm forgetting what that looks like (*swigs drink*) and it was always an electric atmosphere.
The drink swig should help you remember. It does that for me.
Huh...I clicked on this article earlier today and I saw the whole list. I'm not an ESPN insider.
I love how some analysts had us behind South Carolina on the most desirable job list. USCjr came in at a solid #13 on this list with the Muschamp hire.
That's higher than I think it should be.
I haven't read the article to see the numbers but South Carolina's hire deserves to be last on any of these lists.
The worst part about their hire is the fact that they had the jump on everyone else with Spurrier leaving midseason.
That's not because Carolina isn't desirable. It's because they went with Will Muschamp, even though they had firsthand knowledge of how much of a dumpster fire he was as HC at Florida. They could've done a lot better. And they'll get try again in three years when they can his ass after his third strait 50+ point loss to Clemson.
That's pretty much what I was trying to say. USCjr was a very desirable job that pretty much sold itself, but the administration did a terrible job with their hiring process. I am very thankful that we have Whit.
FWIW, Bruce Feldman said on his podcast that his sources said Muschamp was far from their first choice. He says RichRod was offered the job, but turned it down. Sounded like the AD butchered the search a little bit.
I don't trust he who shall not be named when he says that USCe offers him the job. People at USCe say he was not offered the job.
Of course a school is going to deny offering the job to somebody after they turn it down...
Besides you know who and AZ did a single source report he was offered the job? Living in SC not a single beat reporter or local news team reported he was offered.
Well, there's this tweet from the AD...
Yes the AZ AD, who got that info from you know who. Again a single source in SC has never reported he was offered the job. You would think someone, ANYONE would have reported it besides AZ people.
ESPN also reported it. A local SC newspaper also reported it. My guess (pure speculation) is that there was not an 'official' offer, but the AD likely made it very clear that the job was RichRod's if he wanted it. If no media outlet reported Bronco to UVA until it happened, how hard is it to believe that RichRod was offered the job and chose against it, with minimal knowledge of it? If Bronco chose not to accept the UVA job, would it be any different?
Both those articles site the AZ AD as the source.
The reason no media outlet said anything about bronco to loluva is because nobody cares about uva football. Media is driven by fans and well...the spring game attendance says it all
I'm confused. Is Voldemort coaching now? I thought Harry finished him off good the second time.
You dare speak his name?
There is a strong positive correlation between how crazy Helena Bonham Carter acts and how hot she is.
Justin Time!
UVA at number 8. Way too high! I miss Mike London already!
I see it as a positive. Its great beating uva when theyre down, but its REALLY great beating them when they and the rest of the world think they are up. As in 38-0 type beating them when they are up.
yeah but when UVA is up there is that risk that they'll beat us. At this point, after 12 straight, when we eventually lose to them it's going to REALLY REALLY suck. They're going to be so much happier for breaking the streak than anything...I would much rather continue beating an inept team knowing that we're going to beat them every year than have to go into the game every year nervous about what may transpire after a possible upset.
I dunno about you, but I've gone into the last two years nervous about an upset.
so have I. and I hate that feeling. That is precisely why I don't want them to have any hope ever.
Hokie BAKness is in the air!
So... Whit for president in '16?
He has my vote.
But... but... Sandsman is the one who hired Whit!
Oh, that president. Never mind.
How about a campaign for Sands/Babcock (take your pick for POTUS and VP)? They seem like they work well together
ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!! If he's president that means he isn't the AD!
I'm not going to be so quick as to think we'll be in the ACCCG next year. While we can compete for it, UNC has more overall talent than we do, and their recruting has been solid while ours dropped off. It will take at least another year, possibly two or three to catch up.
Fuente was a great hire and the commitment of Evans really comforted me knowing he can sign sought-after players. But we can't expect us to be immediately go back to dominating the Coastal after finish 3 of the last 4 regular seasons 6-6. Just ask Buzz Williams.
Well, to be fair, Buzz Williams had a bigger re-build job.
Having said that, you're right. It could take a couple of years for VT to make it back to the top of the ACC Coastal.
Then again, you never know, so let's get this hype train started! Wooo Hooo!
Leg for beating me.
To be fair, we were playing far below .500 ball in hoops when Buzz came in. We were last in the conference. Fuente is inheriting a MUCH better situation than Buzz walked into, the the degree that I'd argue our conference success next season hinges on how quickly the offense picks up Fuente's scheme. There are playmakers at every skill position, a host of new WR recruits coming in, and a three way battle for the starting QB spot with three very promising recruits going head to head. It's not like Fuente is rebuilding from scratch here.
If the ailment of our program was primarily cultural, as I believe it was, and injection of energy and enthusiasm like Justin Fuente brings might create a quicker turnaround than you are expecting.
The new coach with the biggest challenge is Vice. We can bring in all the WR and QB talent in the world, but if our OL can't block or pass protect, we are going to continue to be inconsistent on offense. I think how quickly we can get the OL back up to snuff is going to determine our ceiling for the next couple of seasons.
UNC's recent recruiting has been about the same as VT. And the talent levels are similar.
Keep in mind this is the Coastal we're talking about.
I would have loved for that to happen again, because it would have meant at least one more divisional win.
I completely understand where you're coming from, and respect any effort to avoid homerism. Like yours, my first reaction is to reach for a reasonable rebuilding timeline. My second thought, though, is to look at the roster and see our most productive starting OL lineup returning, a 1,000* yard RB, a 1,000* yard WR, a stud JUCO QB with two years' experience in the spread already, no Scot Leoffler (!!!), a Bud Foster that seems to have a new spark, and a defense the loses a couple stars in Kendall/Luther/Dadi, but also adds a couple in Settle/Hill/Lydon/Beckett. Our depth sucks, but we definitely could compete for the Coastal next year.
we can compete for the coastal every year. we should. The coastal is garbage
Good post. I think the whole key is getting a QB that can lead the offense. The offensive machine is in place, we just need a guy to drive it and a guy to tell it how to get there. Fuente seems to have his man ready to get behind the wheel - all the hints are there that we have picked up something special. As for Fuente, I think he has proven he knows what he is doing.
The D? Sure, we lose some guys. But we got used to playing without Kendall, and found out we have a handful of guys that fit the bill in the process. And in the "out of sight, out of mind" guys like Settle, Hill, Lydon, Walker etal (as you said)...AND...send that D out there with an offense that inspires them....brrrrrr....
The Coastal will be tough, but I would worry about Miami and Pitt, in addition to UNC. Comparatively to VT:
UNC has the same level of talent, good O and D coaches, but replace a 2+ year (really 4-year) starter at QB.
Pitt has less talent, but a really good D coach, returning their QB, and 2-straight wins over VT. It appears Pitt is improving as a team, at least on the D side.
Miami has better talent, hired a HC with the most impressive resume, returns a talented QB, convincingly beat VT the past 2 years, but Miami has not made any more hires on their coaching staff. More than likely, Richt will put together a top-notch staff, despite not being able hire Pruitt. (Randy Shannon is a strong candidate to return.)
Duke and GT are also solid teams.
The ACC just got FOR REAL.
I agree with everything you said except I wouldn't say that Miami convincingly beat us this year, our offense was capable of moving up and down the field on them, we just screwed ourselves over with turnovers and still lost a close game
If five plays had gone VT's way instead of Miami's, they'd have won that one.
Of course that's true of most games VT played.
I don't see how UNC has more overall talent than VT. IF you use the 247sports rankings from 2013 to the present UNC had a better class in ONE year and that was last year by a total of 2 points. UNC does not recruit out of this world.
Ive been surprised there haven't been more articles rating the coaching hires. Ive been looking and this is the first one Ive seen.
SHSHSHSHAAAA
Leg for King of the Hill gif. We need more of these. Especially ones featuring The Big D, Rusty Shackleford.
I don't always give someone a fake name, but when I do, it's Rusty Shackleford.
Bleacher Report sending the love
Hands down, Justin Fuente moving from Memphis to Virginia Tech is the best hire of the coaching silly season. And it's not just because Fuente did a remarkable job of turning the Tigers program around. Fuente will keep longtime Hokies defensive coordinator Bud Foster on the staff. Talk about having the best of both worlds.
Fuente's shown the ability to win with unheralded recruits while developing them into NFL-caliber players (see: Memphis quarterback Paxton Lynch). Fuente's offensive mind combined with Foster's blue-collar, defensive approach should be a great pair if the two can make it work.
Virginia Tech will always be a Frank Beamer program, but the Hokies haven't been what they once were in recent years and Fuente should be the shot of energy they need to compete for ACC championships again.
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2601254-power-ranking-new-college-foo...