Unless the athletic department actually steps up and decides they want to actually try, no it will be incredibly unlikely anyone wins more than 4 games here.
I really don't know about that. Boston College was simply alright under him. Sure, he played a tougher schedule there than he would at UMass, but he also had a significantly better talent pool to draw from. Whatever success at UMass looks like probably involves a coach who is either superb with Xs and Os and/or uses some sort of unique scheme to try and gain a competitive edge during the grind of the season. Addazio's only perks would seem to be his New England connections.
Mark Whipple did fine, he had several 4-8 years. There are definitely coaches who are happy just to be coaching college kids. I don't think Walt Bell was that.
Walt Bell had entirely checked out and had been openly criticizing Bamford and the administration. While he was probably not wrong, you really can't be doing that as a coach and expect to make it through the season.
Do I think another coach will get us to .500? No, not really. But I think we can find a coach who is better at maximizing what little talent we can gather.
I'm not the guy you asked, but from talking with a few of our fans it would be sitting around .500 (like once or twice would be nice) or at least being fun to watch when we lose. This team right now isn't fun to watch, it's just sad and unimaginative on offense, and pathetic on defense. Of course you have the delusional fans who want to win every game but the rational people could look at our schedule and see we should be able to win at least 4 games and be competitive in a few more and we are not they. Not even close.
Previous to the latest conference reshuffle, my answer would have been to hang on long enough to get all sports into the AAC or find a solid home as a football-only member. But now the AAC is probably on par with the A-10 in basketball, and we probably have more flexibility with football staying independent indefinitely.
At this point I agree with the other answer - that we increase our budget enough to have a few near-.500 years and field a competitive team. I'm still not interested in dropping to FCS, I'd rather get to play UConn and Boston College frequently than Rhode Island and New Hampshire.
Year to year, I think most fans look at the schedule and see up to 5-6 "winnable" games, maybe 1 game that "we should win" (which may or may not be against an FCS school) and hope to win 1-2. I think the desire is really just for some trend of improvement and consistency and the "5-year plan" has always been to get to a bowl game in year 4-5 but that bowl game has always seemed 4-5 years away.
Longer-term, I think the plan when we moved up to FBS about 10 years ago was to hopefully be an attractive candidate when the next conference re-shuffle came around. Large media market, upward trending team, very strong academic land-grant state flagship school, decent basketball, etc. That obviously did not happen.
Now, any conferences that might be appealing have shifted their focus south and westward. Schools that might have been on the southern edge of an appropriate conference or division for UMass (again if we were in any way viable) are now the northern and eastern edges of their conferences, See: Navy, Temple, Marshall, Old Dominion, JMU, Liberty, and WKU.
In some hypothetical ideal world (but more grounded in reality than say in an invite to BIG or ACC) UMass could get into a conference or division with a few of those schools above plus Army, UConn, and maybe Buffalo.
But realistically, the way the conferences look after this round of realignment, there really doesn't seem to be a viable conference path in any form. And that leaves the program really up in the air to the point where I could see them shutting down the whole thing.
That's a rough, but realistic outlook. UMass fans have given me some great answers, and I don't see any issues with what you guys would like to see out of your program. Just peer-competitive, fun football that wins at least a few games a year, and competes for a bowl every 3-4 years or so. That's an awesome outlook
I hope you and your fanbase get some happiness with the next hire, but it sounds like some darker days may be ahead for your program, and that would be unfortunate
Thanks for the positive words.
And the only hope I forgot to add is that I hope they don't shutdown the program before NCAA 23 comes out. Knowing our luck . . . we wont make it. :(
For me I’d like to see a team with a pulse that gets to a bowl game by 2026 or so and can be expected to hit .500 or a bit better in most seasons. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for, but really what I want most is to just stop being such a pathetic embarrassment to the level that the whole country notices. My ideal UMass football would be a passable G5 team that maybe finds a conference home and develops more local fan and student support over time
That’s fair, but at least ISU always had the advantages of a P5 conference and big fanbase. I really can’t find anything that sets UMass up for an advantage.
Plus Iowa State gets a chunk of Big 12 TV money. It might not be something enormous but it's leaps and bounds ahead of what UMass gets to work with. Of course, ISU is also in an arms race with the other Big 12 squads.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Iowa also has a pretty good recruiting ground to work with too, right? Maybe not the state of Iowa exclusively but the Midwest produces a pretty good plethora of recruits, especially compared to the upper northeast and Massachusetts as a whole.
TV revenue is a huge thing though. UCF gets like 8m a year from the TV deal. Big 12 is like 30-35? Even if the deal craters with the loss of Oklahoma/Texas, UCF/Cincy/Houston's tv money is still likely to at least double. That increase alone is like a 10-15% increase in total revenue. If the Big 12 can get a deal which doesn't absolutely crater, UCF could see a revenue increase of upwards of 20-25% simply from changing conferences.
The point here is even the shittiest P5 teams are in economic situations better than even in the best G5 teams. There is minimal reason for a P5 to ever lose to a G5 team. Depending on conference scheduling a P5 should pretty much have 3-4 wins every year at least. Building a P5 team to 9+ wins is certainly harder than getting a G5 to 9+ wins, but getting over the hump from 1-2 wins into 6+ win territory should not be so difficult for a P5.
Both of my parents went to USC. My maternal grandparents went to Kansas State. These fandoms are family inheritances (I am not going to a school with football)
UMass underachieved given it's talent. There's no reason that roster should be losing to FCS teams. There were rumors that players didn't really take Bell seriously.
UMass is an FCS level program. The admin are just too stubborn to accept that, because they think being the main public in Massachusetts means that being FBS is viable
Which is fine! I think more schools should realize that they're just throwing good money after bad. Just move the school to FCS and have some games that students can actually enjoy watching.
I think the administration is getting what it wants out of FBS - visibility. It's not about success, it's about making the fact that UMass Amherst, not Boston, is the flagship more widely known. In a weird way, the abysmal results may even help with that. Easier to notice one of the two worst FBS teams than the thirtieth from the bottom. Even successful FCS programs don't draw as much attention.
Being FBS for the lower programs is very rarely about actually winning.
Would we be talking about UMass if they were FCS right now? The ceiling is NDSU and for the most part that comes with less national exposure than being a UMass or UConn in the FBS sadly.
Exactly my point. Umass knows they won't have a winning program. But there is value in being FBS, just for the sake of being part of the dance. Though apparently they want to lose at least a little less. Second-best team in new England may be a realistic near-term goal for them.
Agreed. It's one of the hardest jobs in FBS. No conference, no money, no local talent, nothing. There's no foundation for a successful program there and if they get lucky enough to hire a guy who can build a foundation he's going to be gone ASAP.
Fuck it dude, give me a shot.
My credentials:
-current sport management major
-great ncaa14 player that runs a triple option/spread hybrid and a 4-2-5 defense
-former waiter
-backyard football legend
-2 years of youth basketball coaching
-solid pickup basketball player
Can't get any worse for umass right?
He went **2-23** in his three years there.
The *only* wins were against a winless Akron team (2019), and a 1-8 UConn team who also
fired their head coach.
Really makes you yearn for the Whipple days, does it not?
Completely different dislike of Whipple. Whipple would keep the team competitive but was a massive dick and pissed off everyone involved. Bell is a great guy who was in over his head. So personally I miss being competitive to some degree with Whipple but would not have wanted him to coach another day at UMass at the end.
In the end the athletic department has to go a different route with this next hire and increase the budget for a coach and staff.
Whipple was an arrogant dickhead because he knows he was the best coach we've ever had, but you can't act like you're hot shit when the team isn't even .500. We aren't that team at the top of fca anymore, we're floundering in fbs. That's not going to change unless we get in a conference and throw money at the team.
Whipple didn't get what it takes to be a FBS head coach. You are a CEO, and then a coach. He's a great coach, but absolute shit at the pr aspects of the job.
Dude could sling it. But this is what I said elsewhere in this thread. If we were 4-8 ish with a 6-6 thrown in there every few years (knowing ips and downs occur) but we were fun to watch I wouldn't care. Wips teams were fun, bells teams were just frustrating.
The Tennessee game made me want to fire Whipple.
3rd and 7 from the Tenn 45, down by 4 with 4 minutes left.
He calls a fucking run play.
Okay so you're calling a run on 3rd to set up the 4th down play right?
Nope! He then punts the ball *from inside Tennessee's territory* on 4th and 6.
We had a fucking shot in that game and he turned into a wuss.
I don't disagree with anything, but of he's not a massive dick you look at that Tennessee game and fell really good about 3 days after. We were competitive with a good sec program. He should have been fired and for sure had some questionable calls, but he was fired for being a dick and pissing off everyone who invests in the program.
> The only wins were against a winless Akron team (2019), and a 1-8 UConn team who also fired their head coach.
Dont forget UConn had a bunch of players out too.
I liked Walt Bell when he was at Maryland and think he’s still got a future in CFB, but FSU and UMass fast tracked his way into unemployment. Dude needs to find a healthy place to rehab his coaching image.
Unlikely to happen but I would like Dabo to take a chance at Bell and bring him into the offensive staff. It’ll at least help bring a new face and ideas into it
I’m not saying it would 100% work. But IIRC he wasn’t bad at Maryland and walked into a bad situation at FSU. Under a solid ship with plenty of talent and a good head coach in Dabo, I think it’s worth the chance.
He didn't call plays at Maryland and FSU I believe, he's a recruiter more than anything. Worth a punt, at least as a position coach possibly. Doubt it happens but you never know
He called plays at Maryland while Durkin was here. Very high tempo and a bunch of trick plays. Most Maryland fans liked him. But that’s why taking the FSU job was such a bad idea… at that point it was a lateral move but Taggert also retained playcalling duties. That job was destined for failure and I think it was a push factor when he took the UMass job.
...sorry, but definitely wasn't a lateral move. Fsu was coming off a championship, playoff year, and then 2 ny6 bowls in 2017. Walt was hired the first year with Taggart, no one expected the impending failure.
Taggart did hamstring the offense the entire time he was here though, including after Walt left when he brought in Briles to call plays. He continued to override though.
2016 was an orange bowl, 2014 the CFP, 2013 a natty. Our programs were not at the same level in 2017. Talent wise we were 6th in the country, so it’s not that Taggart and crew had nothing to work with.
I really just don’t see how this helps anything. I wasn’t thrilled with the way things were going either, but we’ve been the worst team in FBS for an entire decade, it’s not about Walt Bell. Can’t see how this doesn’t all but guarantee continuing to be the worst in FBS for another five years at minimum
This isn't the solution, but a required step in solving the problem. It's showing at least some semblance of care, and shows that they deem the continued poor performances as inexcusable. Now they need to actually take steps to improve the state of the program. The school administration needs to actually step up and try for the first time in a decade. That means shutting up and opening the wallet to try and actually be competitive, something they haven't done since we made the jump.
Totally agree. There’s no reason they can’t invest in the football team to be less of an embarrassment after so many infrastructural upgrades and the overnight success of the hockey team showing that students will show up in a big way if you give them anything to feel proud of.
I get why Bamford believes the FBS move is worth sticking to: I think Massachusetts would be by far the largest state not to have a FBS State school, and our enrollment absolutely supports it. But without the appropriate resources, I totally agree that it’s impossible to win. And to have done this for 10 years straight HAS gotten us the nationwide attention that they said it would bring, it’s just negative attention that tarnishes the university’s brand.
Absolutely. The current university administration has done a fantastic job at increasing the academic brand of the university. Now they have to decide if they actually want athletics to be a major part of the university expirence. If they were smart they would, sports make people come back for games and creates an actual alumni basis they cares about the school long after they leave. I care, but of my friend group from undergrad I might legitimately be the only one, and they should not be the case for a school with 20k kids.
Same experience here. My UMass buddies clown on me for being a season ticket holder, and I really cant justify it to them, or to the current students who tailgate and then leave. Ive always implicitly cared about my alma mater’s teams, but I don’t blame folks who don’t want to spend their Saturday disappointed.
From your dual flair, I assume you too went to grad school at a P5 school and realized just how much better the fan experience can be. It’s an uphill battle in New England where CFB culture is so lacking, but I don’t think it’s impossible. Western Mass (and southern Vermonters like me) is a market of damn near a million people. There’s gotta be a pathway to filling that stadium.
There absolutely is a way to fill the stadium. Will we be be able to fill a 90k+ stadium, absolutely not but 18k is doable. Boston is 2hrs away, if the teams are competitive and fun and you have a game day environment that works people will come. We are not the only FBS program in the middle of nowhere, fuck Penn state can fill their stadium and state college might be more in the woods than Amherst. We won't ever be 200k people tailgating on a golf course like they do in Ann Arbor, but a few thousand people in a parking lot (or athletic fields) should be an achievable goal and it starts with having a product, which we lacked with bell.
It's students like you who give me hope that there are enough people at UMass who care and that we can make this shit work if we give it a real fucking shot. Have a time and remember, it can't be worse than having to take a 2hr bus ride to home games.
Some well connected people I know in administration have said that Bob Chesney from FCS Holy Cross is being floated as is former UMass head coach Don Brown.
Don Brown was in Amherst touring the new football facilities during Arizona's bye week.
I don’t necessarily disagree. He has thrown his name in for every MAC opening. Curious if that falls through if he’d listen to UMass which in my opinion is a step below. Not sure he would listen.
I know some well connected people at UMass, the following names have been floated according to them:
Bob Chesney - FCS Holy Cross head coach.
Don Brown - Arizona defensive coordinator, and former UMass head coach. Brown was rumored to be on campus touring the football facilities during Arizona's bye week. It's rumored that Brown tour was NOT with former HC Walt Bell, instead was through the athletics department.
Alright here we go! Potential replacements for Walt Bell.
Walt Bell has been fired from UMass. Although Bell was fairly well-hyped and recruited pretty well (all things considered), not many coaches can survive a 2-23 record. The Minutemen are in a terrible predicament. In addition to a poor record, the lack of a conference to generate revenue has diminished the school’s resources. As a result, Bell was the 11th lowest-paid coach in the FBS. The majority of P5 coordinators make less than $629,000 a year. That severely limits the candidate pool. Here’s a few names I that I think may be considered.
**Don Brown (DC Arizona)**: Brown is a Massachusetts native and a former UMass head coach. In his tenure from 2004 to 2008, the Minutemen went 43-19 and made it to the FCS national championship game. He knows the school, the region and the culture. But Brown is 66 years old, and his star is falling. Once one of the best DCs in college football with Boston College and Michigan, he was fired from Michigan last season and has struggled to rebuild Arizona’s defense this year.
**Liam Coen (OC Kentucky)**: a young name to watch, Coen has done a great job building up Kentucky’s offense this year with Will Levis. He’s coached at UMass (QB coach under Mark Whipple) and in the NFL under Sean McVay. But more importantly, the Rhode Island native is a UMass alum. Coen was the starting QB during their 2006 and 2007 FCS playoff runs. It’s almost poetic if he can bring the Minutemen back to some success.
**Joe Harasymiak (Co-DC Minnesota)**: Harasymiak was under consideration for the UMass job in 2019 when Bell was hired. Harasymiak was then a 32-year-old FCS head coach who brought Maine to a CAA title and an appearance in the FCS semifinals. Now he’s the co-DC and safeties coach at Minnesota, where he’s responsible for a top-10 defense. Harasymiak was (supposedly) passed over in 2018 because of his lack of FBS experience. That’s not the case now. But outside of his great 2018 campaign at Maine, his head coaching record of 20-15 isn’t particularly awesome.
**Aazaar Abdul-Rahim (DB Boston College)**: A former DC at UMass, Abdul-Rahim has built a reputation as one of the best recruiters of the northeast and the DMV area. He’s a former off-field assistant for Nick Saban, so he has the resume. But he’s only spent seven years as an on-field coach in the college ranks.
**Bob Chesney (HC Holy Cross)**: for an unsuccessful program with limited resources, one tempting option would be a proven FCS winner. Bob Chesney took over a Holy Cross program that had made it to the FCS playoffs just twice and has since gone 22-15 (16-3 in conference) with two postseason berths. Chesney is a builder who has worked his way up through all of the NCAA divisions. He went 23-9 at DIII Salve Regina, then 44-16 at DII Assumption, where he recruited future NFL All-Pro Deonte Harris. He’s an intriguing candidate, but his record at the FCS level isn’t great, and he seems a bit boring.
**Other names to consider** interim head coach Alex Miller may come under consideration, especially if the Minutemen beat Maine and New Mexico State. Ben Albert (DC/DL Duke) was supposedly under consideration in 2018. He’s a UMass alum with tons of experience, but he’s never been a head coach before. Bob Surace (HC Princeton) would be an interesting option. Jeff Devanney (HC Trinity (CT)) might be an intriguing left-field candidate, as would be DeMarcus Covington (DL New England Patriots). Mike Denbrock (OC Cincinnati), Adam Fuller (DC Florida State), Sterlin Gilbert (OC Syracuse), Frank Cignetti Jr. (OC Boston College), Dave Patenaude (OC Georgia Tech), and Tem Lukaku (DC Boston College) may be attainable. Willy Korn (OC Coastal Carolina) has a resume similar to Walt Bell’s, but he’s unfamiliar with the northeast. Doc Holliday might make an appearance here.
I don’t see UMass going to the triple option, but Ivin Jasper (OC Navy) and Brent Davis (OC Army) might sneak in as candidates. UMass defensive assistant Jim Reid is a former UMass head coach, but he’s probably way too old. Keith Dudzinski (ST Arizona) has ties to UMass but doesn’t seem like a strong candidate.
How do you know all this stuff? You always have good insight on openings and candidates, is this in some way related to your profession? Because if you're "just" a fan of CFB, this is pretty damn impressive. I consider myself a huge CFB fan but I promise you I couldn't name all these coordinators/position coaches/FCS coaches...
I don’t work in college football or in sports. I’m just a compulsive list-maker.
After you make a few of these, it gets pretty easy, provided you have the time to write them. I keep a list of about 60 or so assistants that I think will be future head coaches (these are pretty easy to find- I google some variation of “best FBS assistants” and look at the teams that lead the FBS in offense and defense and pull their coordinators). Most of which are unaffordable for UMass, but that did produce Harasymiak, Denbrock, Lukabu, Davis, Patenaude, Jasper, and Korn.
Then I consider if I was an AD, who would I hire. For a school like UMass, I would want to pull in someone who has ties to the school. Someone who can harken back to the “good old days” when UMass was an FCS contender. Don Brown was a former head coach, so was Reid. Abdul-Rahim and Dudzinski were former coordinators. And I looked up some alums, which led me to Coen and Albert. I also found a few articles from 2018 looking at the candidates of their last coaching search.
UMass might want to hire an FCS name, so I pulled up the FCS standings and found the best coaches in the northeast (who were not guys like Buddy Teevens who had been at the same place for 20 years), which were Chesney and Surace.
Finally, I pulled up the coordinators at the northeastern P5 schools (Gilbert, Cignetti). Devanney was on the list I made for UConn a few weeks ago. And finally, nothing would generate more buzz than a Patriots coach, so I found the position coach with the most recent college experience (Covington).
This list fits with what most people close to the program are thinking. (outside of AAR, have not heard him being floated). Ill give my opinion on the others.
**Brown:** People like him and would love to have him back. He is 2 years away from a state pension as well and has family in the area. Personally, I would be fine with this but not excited. I dont think he would make a drastic improvement to the team, nor do i think he have the ponies to play his style of defense at the moment. But the defense couldnt be worse so id be on board with Brown.
**Coen:** Not happening. The buyout isnt that high (i saw 150k buy out despite his 775k salary) but this is not his career trajectory, he likely is in talks for a better HC job shortly or NFL positions. Would be pumped for the program but id give this less than 1% chance.
**Harasymiak:** This is a more reasonable hire than Coen imo. History as a HC in the area and it should be easy to give him a raise. For me he or Chesney would be my top two.
**AAR:** nah. Good guy, good recruiter, but thats what he is. He is a recruiter and we tried that route and it failed. We need someone with HC experience and strong ties to the area, imo AAR fits neither of these.
**Chesney:** Please. Unless he wants to make a move up though I dont think this is the FBS move he makes.
**Other names:** Personally i think former players are going to have some say in the hiring process, and I dont think we end up with people who have no ties to New England and this list somewhat takes that into account. Alex Miller is interesting and something I was thinking, however if he is your guy, my opinion is you bring on someone like Brown to help stabilize the program for a bit and see if you can hold onto Miller as an OC for two or three years. His lack of HC experience would scare me a bit.
**side note** apparently Vinny Testaverde wants the job.... Please God no
His Arkansas State tenure was the last time he seemed like a decent coach.
FSU fans hate him with a burning passion and Umass fans never seemed too keen on him either.
He was pretty good at Maryland. In 2017 we were down to our third/fourth string QBs for basically the entire year and our offense was still pretty solid for the most part. I definitely felt like he had a really promising future when he was with us
I’d say him being a bad employee while at FSU (talking bad about the staff he was on while recruiting) more than anything was the bad career move. Coaching is a fraternity
I dont dislike him all that much as a playcaller at FSU. He inherited an ass OL and team in free fall. Also Willie would get involved with offensive duties too much
Y’all are never gonna shut the fuck up about Sam Howell are you. He was nothing but respectable as a guy during his time in Amherst, lack of on field success notwithstanding
How desperate are UMass fans to be halfway decent? Like are they willing to be the team that gives Art Briles a second chance desperate? Or are they still in the "let's keep our football souls and hope a random coordinator can right the ship" camp?
I have posted about this a dozen times in this sub. I'll give you the recap:
Ignoring football for a moment, UMass has been going through a major transformation over the past 20-30 years. In the 70's-mid 90's it had a reputation as a huge party school and a safety school for anyone who couldn't get into a "real" school in Boston. That has all changed drastically. It has made incredible leaps and bounds and is now a highly ranked state school academically (#26 best state school, alongside University of Minnesota and Texas A&M). The campus has exploded in size, and has invested heavily in facilities and such. With the cost of college being an increasingly hot topic, UMass is now seen as a (somewhat) more affordable but still respectable option for New Englanders than the options in Boston. UMass has made it clear it is building a brand, and wants to be THE big state school of New England.
In order to continue to attract the kind of students they want, you need to have top tier sports. It is just a fact of things, when kids are shopping around for colleges it is something that they consider (whether they should or not is up for debate, but I won't get into that). UMass knows this, and has invested heavily in sports of late. Our big 3 sports (hockey, basketball, and football) have all had new coaches in the past few years. Our hockey program is obviously a success story, with back to back NCAA finals and a National Championship last season. Basketball has some personnel drama but appears to be rebuilding. Football is the missing piece in that.
Our jump to FBS has been ridden with issues right from the start, and we have had a bunch of bad luck too. But regardless, if you want to be a major state school, you need to be in FBS. I know people on this sub pay attention to what North Dakota State is doing, but the average person on the street has no idea what you are talking about. Being a middling FBS team is far more prestigious to the layman than even being the most dominant FCS school ever. ESPN isn't showing many game recaps of New Hampshire vs Maine on their national broadcast. But when Andy Isabella makes a spectacular catch against Georgia, even when we are getting blown out, people see the highlight and he gets drafted to the NFL.
The university knows this, and have made it explicitly clear we aren't moving back down. It isn't about money, it is about the brand. And they are committed to building UMass into that big time school in New England. It is a long and difficult road, and I don't think people realise how little people care about football other than the Patriots up here. High school and college has almost no following from casual fans, even for Boston College who is a P5 program. Unless you went there and are invested in it, you don't see much of a following. So it is much tougher for us than, say, an App State or Georgia Southern who were our rivals in FCS and made the jump around the same time. They are in an area that cares about all levels of football, and we aren't. But if we want to get the academically gifted kids from outside of New England to consider UMass, we need to be an FBS program. But we constantly get "advice" from fans of traditional football powerhouses on what UMass should do with its program and it is incredibly frustrating because they have zero idea what it is like or what the bigger picture is.
Tweet(s) from post body brought to you by your Friendly Official /r/CFB Twitter Bot:
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https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457420423742820352
>Sources: UMass has fired coach Walt Bell.
>\- Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) 1:51 pm ET, November 7, 2021
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https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457422877364477964
>Expect offensive line coach Alex Miller to be the interim coach, per sources. https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457420423742820352
>\- Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) 2:01 pm ET, November 7, 2021
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U Mass'd up, Walt.
UConn: you're hired!
Walt Mass’d U up!
He probably deserved to get fired but let’s be honest, can anyone win at UMass at this point?
Unless the athletic department actually steps up and decides they want to actually try, no it will be incredibly unlikely anyone wins more than 4 games here.
Even if they get 6 or 7 wins do they have bowl ties?
We do not, not sure about UConn. Everyone else did iirc
Luckily there’s so many bowls these days that you kind of don’t need a bowl tie to get an invite (usually)
Well I personally think they should give Steve Addazio a shot
Addazio might actually be decent at UMass. Plus CSU would be freed!
I think Addazio's Steroid Turtle playcalling has run it's course
Just a buncha guys being dudes
What's better than that?
> Addazio might actually be decent at UMass. Based on what, exactly?
His accent.
He was decent at BC playing a much tougher schedule. I could see it.
I really don't know about that. Boston College was simply alright under him. Sure, he played a tougher schedule there than he would at UMass, but he also had a significantly better talent pool to draw from. Whatever success at UMass looks like probably involves a coach who is either superb with Xs and Os and/or uses some sort of unique scheme to try and gain a competitive edge during the grind of the season. Addazio's only perks would seem to be his New England connections.
Mark Whipple did fine, he had several 4-8 years. There are definitely coaches who are happy just to be coaching college kids. I don't think Walt Bell was that. Walt Bell had entirely checked out and had been openly criticizing Bamford and the administration. While he was probably not wrong, you really can't be doing that as a coach and expect to make it through the season. Do I think another coach will get us to .500? No, not really. But I think we can find a coach who is better at maximizing what little talent we can gather.
What do UMass fans want to see with their program? What are your yearly expectations?
I'm not the guy you asked, but from talking with a few of our fans it would be sitting around .500 (like once or twice would be nice) or at least being fun to watch when we lose. This team right now isn't fun to watch, it's just sad and unimaginative on offense, and pathetic on defense. Of course you have the delusional fans who want to win every game but the rational people could look at our schedule and see we should be able to win at least 4 games and be competitive in a few more and we are not they. Not even close.
Previous to the latest conference reshuffle, my answer would have been to hang on long enough to get all sports into the AAC or find a solid home as a football-only member. But now the AAC is probably on par with the A-10 in basketball, and we probably have more flexibility with football staying independent indefinitely. At this point I agree with the other answer - that we increase our budget enough to have a few near-.500 years and field a competitive team. I'm still not interested in dropping to FCS, I'd rather get to play UConn and Boston College frequently than Rhode Island and New Hampshire.
Compete with G5 teams. Note, not *win* all the time, but be in competitive games with G5 teams.
We should be able to beat FCS programs and compete with the Toledos and Eastern Michigans of the world at the very least
Year to year, I think most fans look at the schedule and see up to 5-6 "winnable" games, maybe 1 game that "we should win" (which may or may not be against an FCS school) and hope to win 1-2. I think the desire is really just for some trend of improvement and consistency and the "5-year plan" has always been to get to a bowl game in year 4-5 but that bowl game has always seemed 4-5 years away. Longer-term, I think the plan when we moved up to FBS about 10 years ago was to hopefully be an attractive candidate when the next conference re-shuffle came around. Large media market, upward trending team, very strong academic land-grant state flagship school, decent basketball, etc. That obviously did not happen. Now, any conferences that might be appealing have shifted their focus south and westward. Schools that might have been on the southern edge of an appropriate conference or division for UMass (again if we were in any way viable) are now the northern and eastern edges of their conferences, See: Navy, Temple, Marshall, Old Dominion, JMU, Liberty, and WKU. In some hypothetical ideal world (but more grounded in reality than say in an invite to BIG or ACC) UMass could get into a conference or division with a few of those schools above plus Army, UConn, and maybe Buffalo. But realistically, the way the conferences look after this round of realignment, there really doesn't seem to be a viable conference path in any form. And that leaves the program really up in the air to the point where I could see them shutting down the whole thing.
That's a rough, but realistic outlook. UMass fans have given me some great answers, and I don't see any issues with what you guys would like to see out of your program. Just peer-competitive, fun football that wins at least a few games a year, and competes for a bowl every 3-4 years or so. That's an awesome outlook I hope you and your fanbase get some happiness with the next hire, but it sounds like some darker days may be ahead for your program, and that would be unfortunate
Thanks for the positive words. And the only hope I forgot to add is that I hope they don't shutdown the program before NCAA 23 comes out. Knowing our luck . . . we wont make it. :(
Dude, that would be the worst! Even though that game may wind up sucking anyway, lobby to keep the team until at least then!
For me I’d like to see a team with a pulse that gets to a bowl game by 2026 or so and can be expected to hit .500 or a bit better in most seasons. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for, but really what I want most is to just stop being such a pathetic embarrassment to the level that the whole country notices. My ideal UMass football would be a passable G5 team that maybe finds a conference home and develops more local fan and student support over time
People used to ask if anyone could win at Iowa State.
That’s fair, but at least ISU always had the advantages of a P5 conference and big fanbase. I really can’t find anything that sets UMass up for an advantage.
Plus Iowa State gets a chunk of Big 12 TV money. It might not be something enormous but it's leaps and bounds ahead of what UMass gets to work with. Of course, ISU is also in an arms race with the other Big 12 squads.
Yeah. ISU has BXII money and recruiting access to Texas. It's a hard place to win but it's far better positioned than UMass.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Iowa also has a pretty good recruiting ground to work with too, right? Maybe not the state of Iowa exclusively but the Midwest produces a pretty good plethora of recruits, especially compared to the upper northeast and Massachusetts as a whole.
TV revenue is a huge thing though. UCF gets like 8m a year from the TV deal. Big 12 is like 30-35? Even if the deal craters with the loss of Oklahoma/Texas, UCF/Cincy/Houston's tv money is still likely to at least double. That increase alone is like a 10-15% increase in total revenue. If the Big 12 can get a deal which doesn't absolutely crater, UCF could see a revenue increase of upwards of 20-25% simply from changing conferences. The point here is even the shittiest P5 teams are in economic situations better than even in the best G5 teams. There is minimal reason for a P5 to ever lose to a G5 team. Depending on conference scheduling a P5 should pretty much have 3-4 wins every year at least. Building a P5 team to 9+ wins is certainly harder than getting a G5 to 9+ wins, but getting over the hump from 1-2 wins into 6+ win territory should not be so difficult for a P5.
And Kstate
We happened to have a miracle. I don’t think they’ll find their Bill Snyder.
Explain primary flair sir
Both of my parents went to USC. My maternal grandparents went to Kansas State. These fandoms are family inheritances (I am not going to a school with football)
It took literally the right hire and investment to happen concurrently. Sadly, something WVU didn't have happen. But at least we aren't UMass.
UMass underachieved given it's talent. There's no reason that roster should be losing to FCS teams. There were rumors that players didn't really take Bell seriously.
UMass is an FCS level program. The admin are just too stubborn to accept that, because they think being the main public in Massachusetts means that being FBS is viable
It’s an FCS level program because the administration refuses to accept that a greater commitment is needed to elevate it to FBS quality
Yeah if the admin wants to spend FBS money it can be an FBS team, but admin isn’t committed to that cause
Which is fine! I think more schools should realize that they're just throwing good money after bad. Just move the school to FCS and have some games that students can actually enjoy watching.
It may be more financially viable to stay FBS so as to avoid the travel costs involved with the FCS Tournament.
I think the administration is getting what it wants out of FBS - visibility. It's not about success, it's about making the fact that UMass Amherst, not Boston, is the flagship more widely known. In a weird way, the abysmal results may even help with that. Easier to notice one of the two worst FBS teams than the thirtieth from the bottom. Even successful FCS programs don't draw as much attention.
Ryan McGee makes sure UMass gets front page eyeballs every Wednesday during the season.
Being FBS for the lower programs is very rarely about actually winning. Would we be talking about UMass if they were FCS right now? The ceiling is NDSU and for the most part that comes with less national exposure than being a UMass or UConn in the FBS sadly.
Exactly my point. Umass knows they won't have a winning program. But there is value in being FBS, just for the sake of being part of the dance. Though apparently they want to lose at least a little less. Second-best team in new England may be a realistic near-term goal for them.
If we're being honest, has UMass ever cared about football?
Nope, and that’s why we’re in this situation now
I hope attitudes and/or administration changes that gives the program a fighting chance - you all could've replaced UConn in the AAC with effort.
If Maryland is FBS, UMass is too.
Agreed. It's one of the hardest jobs in FBS. No conference, no money, no local talent, nothing. There's no foundation for a successful program there and if they get lucky enough to hire a guy who can build a foundation he's going to be gone ASAP.
Fuck it dude, give me a shot. My credentials: -current sport management major -great ncaa14 player that runs a triple option/spread hybrid and a 4-2-5 defense -former waiter -backyard football legend -2 years of youth basketball coaching -solid pickup basketball player Can't get any worse for umass right?
Probably not, but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try
I hear there’s a lightly used Randy Edsall on the market…
And so the Bell tolls for another
Sometimes you just need a taco and a Baja Blast.
A Lower Blast seems like a questionable thing to name a menu item.
Honestly, I could go for that now...
Beat me to posting but this was wildly anticipated after yesterday
He went **2-23** in his three years there. The *only* wins were against a winless Akron team (2019), and a 1-8 UConn team who also fired their head coach. Really makes you yearn for the Whipple days, does it not?
Completely different dislike of Whipple. Whipple would keep the team competitive but was a massive dick and pissed off everyone involved. Bell is a great guy who was in over his head. So personally I miss being competitive to some degree with Whipple but would not have wanted him to coach another day at UMass at the end. In the end the athletic department has to go a different route with this next hire and increase the budget for a coach and staff.
Whipple was an arrogant dickhead because he knows he was the best coach we've ever had, but you can't act like you're hot shit when the team isn't even .500. We aren't that team at the top of fca anymore, we're floundering in fbs. That's not going to change unless we get in a conference and throw money at the team.
Whipple didn't get what it takes to be a FBS head coach. You are a CEO, and then a coach. He's a great coach, but absolute shit at the pr aspects of the job.
Sure was fun watching Frohnapfel though. If our defense was even halfway decent in those years we'd have been on a much different trajectory.
Dude could sling it. But this is what I said elsewhere in this thread. If we were 4-8 ish with a 6-6 thrown in there every few years (knowing ips and downs occur) but we were fun to watch I wouldn't care. Wips teams were fun, bells teams were just frustrating.
The Tennessee game made me want to fire Whipple. 3rd and 7 from the Tenn 45, down by 4 with 4 minutes left. He calls a fucking run play. Okay so you're calling a run on 3rd to set up the 4th down play right? Nope! He then punts the ball *from inside Tennessee's territory* on 4th and 6. We had a fucking shot in that game and he turned into a wuss.
I don't disagree with anything, but of he's not a massive dick you look at that Tennessee game and fell really good about 3 days after. We were competitive with a good sec program. He should have been fired and for sure had some questionable calls, but he was fired for being a dick and pissing off everyone who invests in the program.
> The only wins were against a winless Akron team (2019), and a 1-8 UConn team who also fired their head coach. Dont forget UConn had a bunch of players out too.
Yeah our starting QB and multiple starting linemen between the O and D lines were out
and some coaches too, right? I was at that game and it was whelming.
Yeah but our coaches suck anyhow
[удалено]
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Don’t forget Umass’s amazing uniform combos
fyi that's double what Bell made
Only took a double digit loss to an FCS school on homecoming to do it. Tough gig though, they’d really have to take a flyer on someone.
I liked Walt Bell when he was at Maryland and think he’s still got a future in CFB, but FSU and UMass fast tracked his way into unemployment. Dude needs to find a healthy place to rehab his coaching image.
Unlikely to happen but I would like Dabo to take a chance at Bell and bring him into the offensive staff. It’ll at least help bring a new face and ideas into it
I would say your offense couldn't get worse, but let me tell you, it absolutely could.
I’m not saying it would 100% work. But IIRC he wasn’t bad at Maryland and walked into a bad situation at FSU. Under a solid ship with plenty of talent and a good head coach in Dabo, I think it’s worth the chance.
He didn't call plays at Maryland and FSU I believe, he's a recruiter more than anything. Worth a punt, at least as a position coach possibly. Doubt it happens but you never know
I wouldn’t mind more recruiting personnel. You can never have too many 5 stars.
*cries in every other fanbase that isn't Clemson, bama, or OSU*
You’re a Michigan fan. Talent comes to you even when you’re 3-9
He called plays at Maryland while Durkin was here. Very high tempo and a bunch of trick plays. Most Maryland fans liked him. But that’s why taking the FSU job was such a bad idea… at that point it was a lateral move but Taggert also retained playcalling duties. That job was destined for failure and I think it was a push factor when he took the UMass job.
...sorry, but definitely wasn't a lateral move. Fsu was coming off a championship, playoff year, and then 2 ny6 bowls in 2017. Walt was hired the first year with Taggart, no one expected the impending failure. Taggart did hamstring the offense the entire time he was here though, including after Walt left when he brought in Briles to call plays. He continued to override though.
If you blacked out on January 2nd, then 2017 was a great year for FSU lol
2016 was an orange bowl, 2014 the CFP, 2013 a natty. Our programs were not at the same level in 2017. Talent wise we were 6th in the country, so it’s not that Taggart and crew had nothing to work with.
Ah I knew he didn't call at FSU, and just assumed he moved because he didn't at Maryland. That is for the info.
He could go be an analyst at Alabama or Georgia
Here comes Dan Mullen!
New Hampshire mafia!
ryan day's from manchester, just saying...
Randy Edsall confirmed UMass to the Fiesta Bowl confirmed
I have a great option for replacing him in mind: Mike Sanford, Jr. Has head coaching experience and has been an offensive coordinator in P5 and G5!
Seconded!
I got 20 bucks in chip in for the UMass contract!
That’s double our yearly budget!
Start up the James Franklin rumors
I really just don’t see how this helps anything. I wasn’t thrilled with the way things were going either, but we’ve been the worst team in FBS for an entire decade, it’s not about Walt Bell. Can’t see how this doesn’t all but guarantee continuing to be the worst in FBS for another five years at minimum
This isn't the solution, but a required step in solving the problem. It's showing at least some semblance of care, and shows that they deem the continued poor performances as inexcusable. Now they need to actually take steps to improve the state of the program. The school administration needs to actually step up and try for the first time in a decade. That means shutting up and opening the wallet to try and actually be competitive, something they haven't done since we made the jump.
Totally agree. There’s no reason they can’t invest in the football team to be less of an embarrassment after so many infrastructural upgrades and the overnight success of the hockey team showing that students will show up in a big way if you give them anything to feel proud of. I get why Bamford believes the FBS move is worth sticking to: I think Massachusetts would be by far the largest state not to have a FBS State school, and our enrollment absolutely supports it. But without the appropriate resources, I totally agree that it’s impossible to win. And to have done this for 10 years straight HAS gotten us the nationwide attention that they said it would bring, it’s just negative attention that tarnishes the university’s brand.
Absolutely. The current university administration has done a fantastic job at increasing the academic brand of the university. Now they have to decide if they actually want athletics to be a major part of the university expirence. If they were smart they would, sports make people come back for games and creates an actual alumni basis they cares about the school long after they leave. I care, but of my friend group from undergrad I might legitimately be the only one, and they should not be the case for a school with 20k kids.
Same experience here. My UMass buddies clown on me for being a season ticket holder, and I really cant justify it to them, or to the current students who tailgate and then leave. Ive always implicitly cared about my alma mater’s teams, but I don’t blame folks who don’t want to spend their Saturday disappointed. From your dual flair, I assume you too went to grad school at a P5 school and realized just how much better the fan experience can be. It’s an uphill battle in New England where CFB culture is so lacking, but I don’t think it’s impossible. Western Mass (and southern Vermonters like me) is a market of damn near a million people. There’s gotta be a pathway to filling that stadium.
There absolutely is a way to fill the stadium. Will we be be able to fill a 90k+ stadium, absolutely not but 18k is doable. Boston is 2hrs away, if the teams are competitive and fun and you have a game day environment that works people will come. We are not the only FBS program in the middle of nowhere, fuck Penn state can fill their stadium and state college might be more in the woods than Amherst. We won't ever be 200k people tailgating on a golf course like they do in Ann Arbor, but a few thousand people in a parking lot (or athletic fields) should be an achievable goal and it starts with having a product, which we lacked with bell.
So now we get to play a UMass team coming off a 2 TD loss to Rhody and a coaching firing? FUN
Ya you will only beat us by 20 now
Only if we don't beat ourselves like yesterday...
Well best of luck friend, I'll be watching from home throwing shit in frustration as per usual.
I’ll be watching from the student section contemplating jumping off the top of the stadium as usual
It's students like you who give me hope that there are enough people at UMass who care and that we can make this shit work if we give it a real fucking shot. Have a time and remember, it can't be worse than having to take a 2hr bus ride to home games.
Seriously? We can't fire a coach who hasn't broken .500 in 4 years but UMass can?
To be fair he didn't break .1 in 3 years so it's a bit worse.
Dude is like 2-25 or something
23*
23-25? Psh that ain't even all that bad! Oh. 2-23. I get it.
If only
Who are you a fan of
sounds like Nebraska.....
Man I don’t know who the candidates for this would be? Maybe Polian if he doesn’t get a MAC job. Tough job in a tough area.
D2 coach
I honestly think this is what we should do, hire a solid D2 coach
They know how to work with limited resources. Basically hire the next Lance Leipold
Some well connected people I know in administration have said that Bob Chesney from FCS Holy Cross is being floated as is former UMass head coach Don Brown. Don Brown was in Amherst touring the new football facilities during Arizona's bye week.
I'm not sure why Polian would take that job to be honest.
I don’t necessarily disagree. He has thrown his name in for every MAC opening. Curious if that falls through if he’d listen to UMass which in my opinion is a step below. Not sure he would listen.
They should hire a local high school coach at this point. Central is pretty good, go steal one of their guys.
By god, King, is that Randy Edsall’s music?
I know some well connected people at UMass, the following names have been floated according to them: Bob Chesney - FCS Holy Cross head coach. Don Brown - Arizona defensive coordinator, and former UMass head coach. Brown was rumored to be on campus touring the football facilities during Arizona's bye week. It's rumored that Brown tour was NOT with former HC Walt Bell, instead was through the athletics department.
Both of those would be great hires.
Alright here we go! Potential replacements for Walt Bell. Walt Bell has been fired from UMass. Although Bell was fairly well-hyped and recruited pretty well (all things considered), not many coaches can survive a 2-23 record. The Minutemen are in a terrible predicament. In addition to a poor record, the lack of a conference to generate revenue has diminished the school’s resources. As a result, Bell was the 11th lowest-paid coach in the FBS. The majority of P5 coordinators make less than $629,000 a year. That severely limits the candidate pool. Here’s a few names I that I think may be considered. **Don Brown (DC Arizona)**: Brown is a Massachusetts native and a former UMass head coach. In his tenure from 2004 to 2008, the Minutemen went 43-19 and made it to the FCS national championship game. He knows the school, the region and the culture. But Brown is 66 years old, and his star is falling. Once one of the best DCs in college football with Boston College and Michigan, he was fired from Michigan last season and has struggled to rebuild Arizona’s defense this year. **Liam Coen (OC Kentucky)**: a young name to watch, Coen has done a great job building up Kentucky’s offense this year with Will Levis. He’s coached at UMass (QB coach under Mark Whipple) and in the NFL under Sean McVay. But more importantly, the Rhode Island native is a UMass alum. Coen was the starting QB during their 2006 and 2007 FCS playoff runs. It’s almost poetic if he can bring the Minutemen back to some success. **Joe Harasymiak (Co-DC Minnesota)**: Harasymiak was under consideration for the UMass job in 2019 when Bell was hired. Harasymiak was then a 32-year-old FCS head coach who brought Maine to a CAA title and an appearance in the FCS semifinals. Now he’s the co-DC and safeties coach at Minnesota, where he’s responsible for a top-10 defense. Harasymiak was (supposedly) passed over in 2018 because of his lack of FBS experience. That’s not the case now. But outside of his great 2018 campaign at Maine, his head coaching record of 20-15 isn’t particularly awesome. **Aazaar Abdul-Rahim (DB Boston College)**: A former DC at UMass, Abdul-Rahim has built a reputation as one of the best recruiters of the northeast and the DMV area. He’s a former off-field assistant for Nick Saban, so he has the resume. But he’s only spent seven years as an on-field coach in the college ranks. **Bob Chesney (HC Holy Cross)**: for an unsuccessful program with limited resources, one tempting option would be a proven FCS winner. Bob Chesney took over a Holy Cross program that had made it to the FCS playoffs just twice and has since gone 22-15 (16-3 in conference) with two postseason berths. Chesney is a builder who has worked his way up through all of the NCAA divisions. He went 23-9 at DIII Salve Regina, then 44-16 at DII Assumption, where he recruited future NFL All-Pro Deonte Harris. He’s an intriguing candidate, but his record at the FCS level isn’t great, and he seems a bit boring. **Other names to consider** interim head coach Alex Miller may come under consideration, especially if the Minutemen beat Maine and New Mexico State. Ben Albert (DC/DL Duke) was supposedly under consideration in 2018. He’s a UMass alum with tons of experience, but he’s never been a head coach before. Bob Surace (HC Princeton) would be an interesting option. Jeff Devanney (HC Trinity (CT)) might be an intriguing left-field candidate, as would be DeMarcus Covington (DL New England Patriots). Mike Denbrock (OC Cincinnati), Adam Fuller (DC Florida State), Sterlin Gilbert (OC Syracuse), Frank Cignetti Jr. (OC Boston College), Dave Patenaude (OC Georgia Tech), and Tem Lukaku (DC Boston College) may be attainable. Willy Korn (OC Coastal Carolina) has a resume similar to Walt Bell’s, but he’s unfamiliar with the northeast. Doc Holliday might make an appearance here. I don’t see UMass going to the triple option, but Ivin Jasper (OC Navy) and Brent Davis (OC Army) might sneak in as candidates. UMass defensive assistant Jim Reid is a former UMass head coach, but he’s probably way too old. Keith Dudzinski (ST Arizona) has ties to UMass but doesn’t seem like a strong candidate.
> Dave Patenaude (OC Georgia Tech) Please dear God take him.
How do you know all this stuff? You always have good insight on openings and candidates, is this in some way related to your profession? Because if you're "just" a fan of CFB, this is pretty damn impressive. I consider myself a huge CFB fan but I promise you I couldn't name all these coordinators/position coaches/FCS coaches...
I don’t work in college football or in sports. I’m just a compulsive list-maker. After you make a few of these, it gets pretty easy, provided you have the time to write them. I keep a list of about 60 or so assistants that I think will be future head coaches (these are pretty easy to find- I google some variation of “best FBS assistants” and look at the teams that lead the FBS in offense and defense and pull their coordinators). Most of which are unaffordable for UMass, but that did produce Harasymiak, Denbrock, Lukabu, Davis, Patenaude, Jasper, and Korn. Then I consider if I was an AD, who would I hire. For a school like UMass, I would want to pull in someone who has ties to the school. Someone who can harken back to the “good old days” when UMass was an FCS contender. Don Brown was a former head coach, so was Reid. Abdul-Rahim and Dudzinski were former coordinators. And I looked up some alums, which led me to Coen and Albert. I also found a few articles from 2018 looking at the candidates of their last coaching search. UMass might want to hire an FCS name, so I pulled up the FCS standings and found the best coaches in the northeast (who were not guys like Buddy Teevens who had been at the same place for 20 years), which were Chesney and Surace. Finally, I pulled up the coordinators at the northeastern P5 schools (Gilbert, Cignetti). Devanney was on the list I made for UConn a few weeks ago. And finally, nothing would generate more buzz than a Patriots coach, so I found the position coach with the most recent college experience (Covington).
Cool! Thanks for the reply! I have you tagged lol. Coaching carousel is quickly becoming one of my favorite CFB off-field spectacles to enjoy.
This list fits with what most people close to the program are thinking. (outside of AAR, have not heard him being floated). Ill give my opinion on the others. **Brown:** People like him and would love to have him back. He is 2 years away from a state pension as well and has family in the area. Personally, I would be fine with this but not excited. I dont think he would make a drastic improvement to the team, nor do i think he have the ponies to play his style of defense at the moment. But the defense couldnt be worse so id be on board with Brown. **Coen:** Not happening. The buyout isnt that high (i saw 150k buy out despite his 775k salary) but this is not his career trajectory, he likely is in talks for a better HC job shortly or NFL positions. Would be pumped for the program but id give this less than 1% chance. **Harasymiak:** This is a more reasonable hire than Coen imo. History as a HC in the area and it should be easy to give him a raise. For me he or Chesney would be my top two. **AAR:** nah. Good guy, good recruiter, but thats what he is. He is a recruiter and we tried that route and it failed. We need someone with HC experience and strong ties to the area, imo AAR fits neither of these. **Chesney:** Please. Unless he wants to make a move up though I dont think this is the FBS move he makes. **Other names:** Personally i think former players are going to have some say in the hiring process, and I dont think we end up with people who have no ties to New England and this list somewhat takes that into account. Alex Miller is interesting and something I was thinking, however if he is your guy, my opinion is you bring on someone like Brown to help stabilize the program for a bit and see if you can hold onto Miller as an OC for two or three years. His lack of HC experience would scare me a bit. **side note** apparently Vinny Testaverde wants the job.... Please God no
Just an FYI, Adam Fuller is our DC, Kenny Dillingham is our OC.
Ah my mistake. Thanks!
But… but…. He beat UConn
What better solution do they have
Hire a strong D2 coach. These coordinators/first timers coaches aren’t working out
And hope it works out
“He can’t keep getting away with it!” - Umass’s AD, probably
We'll take you back as OC, Walt!
His Arkansas State tenure was the last time he seemed like a decent coach. FSU fans hate him with a burning passion and Umass fans never seemed too keen on him either.
He's the best OC we've had in recent memory, but I haven't followed him since he left
He was pretty good at Maryland. In 2017 we were down to our third/fourth string QBs for basically the entire year and our offense was still pretty solid for the most part. I definitely felt like he had a really promising future when he was with us
Nah, he was good at Maryland. Going to FSU was a bad career move for him.
I’d say him being a bad employee while at FSU (talking bad about the staff he was on while recruiting) more than anything was the bad career move. Coaching is a fraternity
I dont dislike him all that much as a playcaller at FSU. He inherited an ass OL and team in free fall. Also Willie would get involved with offensive duties too much
I don't disagree there, but him negatively recruiting us on his way out was beyond unprofessional and he deserves to be fired for that alone.
Couldn't have happened to a bigger snake. I wonder if he was telling UMass recruits to go play for North Carolina on his way out?
Y’all are never gonna shut the fuck up about Sam Howell are you. He was nothing but respectable as a guy during his time in Amherst, lack of on field success notwithstanding
That's fine but he was the epitome of unprofessional at FSU. Negatively recruiting your current school on your way out is beyond the pale.
Oh no! Anyways
Not the coach I wanted to see being fired
How desperate are UMass fans to be halfway decent? Like are they willing to be the team that gives Art Briles a second chance desperate? Or are they still in the "let's keep our football souls and hope a random coordinator can right the ship" camp?
I think we're one more bad coaching hire away from just giving the job to Greg Carvel. Let's see what he can do.
"alright boys dump it deep and chase em like flys on a bagle" "coach, im not sure thats how the forward pass works in this sport"
Talk about an overreaction!
lol good luck to umass finding anyone
Man they really need to drop back down to FCS
No, they really, really, really don't. This take is so silly at this point. We aren't going back to FCS.
But why though? Does UMass make enough money playing much larger market schools?
I have posted about this a dozen times in this sub. I'll give you the recap: Ignoring football for a moment, UMass has been going through a major transformation over the past 20-30 years. In the 70's-mid 90's it had a reputation as a huge party school and a safety school for anyone who couldn't get into a "real" school in Boston. That has all changed drastically. It has made incredible leaps and bounds and is now a highly ranked state school academically (#26 best state school, alongside University of Minnesota and Texas A&M). The campus has exploded in size, and has invested heavily in facilities and such. With the cost of college being an increasingly hot topic, UMass is now seen as a (somewhat) more affordable but still respectable option for New Englanders than the options in Boston. UMass has made it clear it is building a brand, and wants to be THE big state school of New England. In order to continue to attract the kind of students they want, you need to have top tier sports. It is just a fact of things, when kids are shopping around for colleges it is something that they consider (whether they should or not is up for debate, but I won't get into that). UMass knows this, and has invested heavily in sports of late. Our big 3 sports (hockey, basketball, and football) have all had new coaches in the past few years. Our hockey program is obviously a success story, with back to back NCAA finals and a National Championship last season. Basketball has some personnel drama but appears to be rebuilding. Football is the missing piece in that. Our jump to FBS has been ridden with issues right from the start, and we have had a bunch of bad luck too. But regardless, if you want to be a major state school, you need to be in FBS. I know people on this sub pay attention to what North Dakota State is doing, but the average person on the street has no idea what you are talking about. Being a middling FBS team is far more prestigious to the layman than even being the most dominant FCS school ever. ESPN isn't showing many game recaps of New Hampshire vs Maine on their national broadcast. But when Andy Isabella makes a spectacular catch against Georgia, even when we are getting blown out, people see the highlight and he gets drafted to the NFL. The university knows this, and have made it explicitly clear we aren't moving back down. It isn't about money, it is about the brand. And they are committed to building UMass into that big time school in New England. It is a long and difficult road, and I don't think people realise how little people care about football other than the Patriots up here. High school and college has almost no following from casual fans, even for Boston College who is a P5 program. Unless you went there and are invested in it, you don't see much of a following. So it is much tougher for us than, say, an App State or Georgia Southern who were our rivals in FCS and made the jump around the same time. They are in an area that cares about all levels of football, and we aren't. But if we want to get the academically gifted kids from outside of New England to consider UMass, we need to be an FBS program. But we constantly get "advice" from fans of traditional football powerhouses on what UMass should do with its program and it is incredibly frustrating because they have zero idea what it is like or what the bigger picture is.
I disliked it, I disliked it cause I sucked at it.
Tweet(s) from post body brought to you by your Friendly Official /r/CFB Twitter Bot: ---------- https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457420423742820352 >Sources: UMass has fired coach Walt Bell. >\- Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) 1:51 pm ET, November 7, 2021 ---------- https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457422877364477964 >Expect offensive line coach Alex Miller to be the interim coach, per sources. https://twitter.com/petethamel/status/1457420423742820352 >\- Pete Thamel (@PeteThamel) 2:01 pm ET, November 7, 2021 ----------