That phrase is going to take a little getting used to it, but it sounds pretty sweet to the ears right now.
I'm still waiting for it to be announced on http://www.mgoblue.com/ or to see him at a press conference in a block M hat before I'm 100% convinced it's actually really true, but it's been picked up by ESPN, the Freep, Rivals, and various TV and radio outlets both in Michigan and West Virginia.
The official announcement is supposedly due at 3pm ET.
As we recently did with our basketball coaching vacancy, we turned to the hills of West Virginia to find our savior. Rich Rodriguez has been incredibly successful as the headcoach of the Mountaineers since 2001. Rodriguez played defensive back at WVU under coach Don Nehlen, who a Michigan assistant with Bo prior to taking the head coaching job at WVU.
The face of Michigan football is about to drastically change. Rodriguez's teams have been known for a high octane run-option spread offense with star players like Pat White and Steve Slaton thriving and garnering national recognition. Rodriguez had the Mountaineers within one game of playing in the National Championship game this season.
He is an exciting choice and should be the shot in the arm that Michigan needs to start competing at the elite level once again.
UPDATE: The only thing more official than this will be seeing him touch that GO BLUE banner next fall. Eight inches of snow fell in Ann Arbor last night, but it feels like our long cold winter has just come to an end.
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Bowl Game set, Coach very not set.
One of the 800lb question marks surrounding Michigan football has been answered:
Michigan will play in the Capital One Bowl in Orlando against the Florida Gators.
The good: Highest profile non-BCS game, with the largest non-BCS payout, and there's always a bit of extra prestige to playing on New Years Day rather than in late December
The bad: We are likely to get destroyed by Florida.
The ugly: OSU has snuck back into the National Championship game, against Les Miles' LSU Tigers. And we Michigan fans thought we were conflicted over who to pull for in last year's title game? Furthermore, the entire Big 10 is going to look very ugly when the bowl season has completed. Check out some of these other "neutral site" matchups:
Ohio State vs. Louisiana State in New Orleans (BCS Championship Game)
Illinois vs Southern Cal in Pasadena (Rose Bowl)
Michigan vs. Florida in Orlando (Capital One)
Penn State vs. Texas A&M in San Antonio (Alamo)
Even Purdue has to play against a team in its home state, as it drew Central Michigan in the Motor City Bowl! Although the Boilers may be the only Big 10 team favored to win their matchup. The other Big 10 bowl matchups:
Wisconsin vs. Tennessee (Outback Bowl, Tampa, FL)
Michigan State vs. Boston College (Champs Sports Bowl, Orlando, FL)
Indiana vs. Oklahoma State (Insight Bowl, Tempe, AZ)
Coach Search
Status? One giant clusterfrack. Bill Martin apparently contacted Miles' agent this morning, verified what Miles said in his press conference yesterday--that he intends to sign the extension and stay at LSU--and is now moving on. There are no obvious front-runners at the moment, although Michigan's current Defensive Coordinator Ron English is apparently being granted a second interview and would appear to be the leader at the moment.
Hardly an inspiring choice, but at least it's not Mike DeBord.
Brian Kelly from Cincinnati (formerly CMU and Grand Valley State) appears to not be a candidate for reasons so far not publicly known, which is a shame as I've been waffling between him and Miles for a while now. His resume thus far appears to be a combination of Urban Meyer's and Jim Tressell's prior to their current appointments.
If Kelly is in fact out, I'd love to see us swing for the fences and try and pull Jeff Tedford away from Cal. The Bears had a disappointing season this year, but his track record at an academic Pac 10 also-ran has been incredibly impressive. But I don't think that is likely.
I want to clarify my position on Miles a bit, but will save that for another post.
Michigan will play in the Capital One Bowl in Orlando against the Florida Gators.
The good: Highest profile non-BCS game, with the largest non-BCS payout, and there's always a bit of extra prestige to playing on New Years Day rather than in late December
The bad: We are likely to get destroyed by Florida.
The ugly: OSU has snuck back into the National Championship game, against Les Miles' LSU Tigers. And we Michigan fans thought we were conflicted over who to pull for in last year's title game? Furthermore, the entire Big 10 is going to look very ugly when the bowl season has completed. Check out some of these other "neutral site" matchups:
Ohio State vs. Louisiana State in New Orleans (BCS Championship Game)
Illinois vs Southern Cal in Pasadena (Rose Bowl)
Michigan vs. Florida in Orlando (Capital One)
Penn State vs. Texas A&M in San Antonio (Alamo)
Even Purdue has to play against a team in its home state, as it drew Central Michigan in the Motor City Bowl! Although the Boilers may be the only Big 10 team favored to win their matchup. The other Big 10 bowl matchups:
Wisconsin vs. Tennessee (Outback Bowl, Tampa, FL)
Michigan State vs. Boston College (Champs Sports Bowl, Orlando, FL)
Indiana vs. Oklahoma State (Insight Bowl, Tempe, AZ)
Coach Search
Status? One giant clusterfrack. Bill Martin apparently contacted Miles' agent this morning, verified what Miles said in his press conference yesterday--that he intends to sign the extension and stay at LSU--and is now moving on. There are no obvious front-runners at the moment, although Michigan's current Defensive Coordinator Ron English is apparently being granted a second interview and would appear to be the leader at the moment.
Hardly an inspiring choice, but at least it's not Mike DeBord.
Brian Kelly from Cincinnati (formerly CMU and Grand Valley State) appears to not be a candidate for reasons so far not publicly known, which is a shame as I've been waffling between him and Miles for a while now. His resume thus far appears to be a combination of Urban Meyer's and Jim Tressell's prior to their current appointments.
If Kelly is in fact out, I'd love to see us swing for the fences and try and pull Jeff Tedford away from Cal. The Bears had a disappointing season this year, but his track record at an academic Pac 10 also-ran has been incredibly impressive. But I don't think that is likely.
I want to clarify my position on Miles a bit, but will save that for another post.
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Just about the worst M sports day ever.
It would certainly appear, based on the post-game press-conference, that Michigan's courtship of Les Miles is over. To add insult to injury, the basketball team lost today, by double digits, to Harvard. Harvard's current coach, by the way? Tommy Amaker.
Not a good day to be Michigan AD Bill Martin.
And to add insult to insult, both West Virginia and Missouri appear to losing. If either one of them loses, Ohio State is headed back to the BCS title game. Ugh.
Any silver lining? Yes. The hockey team got their act together and beat OSU 4-2 tonight at Yost.
Not a good day to be Michigan AD Bill Martin.
And to add insult to insult, both West Virginia and Missouri appear to losing. If either one of them loses, Ohio State is headed back to the BCS title game. Ugh.
Any silver lining? Yes. The hockey team got their act together and beat OSU 4-2 tonight at Yost.
As expected.
Back from paying my last installment of shade tax (there's something to be said about having a nice, well-shaded yard in the summer. There's also a price to be paid for it.).
As expected, things have waffled back and forth... Miles held a brief press conference in which he basically lashed out at the media for reporting some misinformation. Whether the misinformation was "Miles to Michigan" or "Miles to stay at LSU", however, was not addressed, nor did he flat-out confirm either side of the story.
The bulk of the news right now seems to be leaning pretty solidly towards him staying put, but the lack of a clear statement from him right now gives a pretty bright beacon of hope.
Here's a clip of the press conference (via MGoBlog):
As expected, things have waffled back and forth... Miles held a brief press conference in which he basically lashed out at the media for reporting some misinformation. Whether the misinformation was "Miles to Michigan" or "Miles to stay at LSU", however, was not addressed, nor did he flat-out confirm either side of the story.
The bulk of the news right now seems to be leaning pretty solidly towards him staying put, but the lack of a clear statement from him right now gives a pretty bright beacon of hope.
Here's a clip of the press conference (via MGoBlog):
Which do you like better: Ping-Pong, or Tug-O-War?
Pick your analogy, but either one seems to fit what's going on. ESPN has apparently presented both sides of the coin in the past 20 minutes. Miles to Michigan. Not so fast, my friend. No wait, yes, Miles still to Michigan. Maybe.
This is a live wire event, folks. Too bad I'm the only soul alive that knows of the existence of this blog at this moment. Since the last post (i.e. 10 minutes ago) it seems the sources reporting LSU's contract extension were a bit exaggerated/premature. They may be working on a last-ditch effort to keep him, but it doesn't look like anything has been signed yet--on either side.
Further too bad that I need to go try and take care of the rest of the leaves in my yard before that winter storm they're predicting hits. I expect by the time I come back in, this story will have bounced back and forth several times, and Les Miles will either definitely be or not be our coach for next year.
Maybe.
This is a live wire event, folks. Too bad I'm the only soul alive that knows of the existence of this blog at this moment. Since the last post (i.e. 10 minutes ago) it seems the sources reporting LSU's contract extension were a bit exaggerated/premature. They may be working on a last-ditch effort to keep him, but it doesn't look like anything has been signed yet--on either side.
Further too bad that I need to go try and take care of the rest of the leaves in my yard before that winter storm they're predicting hits. I expect by the time I come back in, this story will have bounced back and forth several times, and Les Miles will either definitely be or not be our coach for next year.
Maybe.
No time for formal introductions
Stuff is happening NOW and I want to at least get a quick re-cap up here. If nothing else, it may be humorous/depressing to look back on in the days ahead.
I set this blog up this morning, then made a quick run out to Lowe's. As I was driving around town, I was thinking up titles and catchy taglines to describe what appeared to be the near-finality of the coaching search. I was trying to come up with something about a shortage of eggs to cover all the faces and work in a "Dewey Defeats Truman" joke to describe what would transpire if Michigan did NOT hire Les Miles as it's next head coach. I was even mentally preparing a post entitled "Tenutious D" about Jon Tenuta, who Miles had allegedly already selected to be his Defensive Coordinator. That's how much smoke there was as of when I left this morning indicating that that would come true.
I was only gone an hour or so, and I come back and scan the message boards to find that a giant space chicken may have just dropped the mother of all eggs onto the Dewey estate.
According to Rivals.com board moderators, it looks like LSU decided to play last-second hardball and that Miles has just signed an extension to stay at LSU.
These are tumultuous times, and I don't think we're going to know for sure what is going on until later today or tomorrow, but it looks like the odds of Les Miles being Michigan's next coach just swung from about 95% to about 5% over the span of the past hour.
But, if nothing else, this is the rich drama of sports, even off the field. It could be that this is a done deal and we need to move on to someone else, or it could still be just one bad source stirring up a heap of trouble and things could still swing back around.
Either way, sit back, buckle up, and (try to) enjoy the ride...
I set this blog up this morning, then made a quick run out to Lowe's. As I was driving around town, I was thinking up titles and catchy taglines to describe what appeared to be the near-finality of the coaching search. I was trying to come up with something about a shortage of eggs to cover all the faces and work in a "Dewey Defeats Truman" joke to describe what would transpire if Michigan did NOT hire Les Miles as it's next head coach. I was even mentally preparing a post entitled "Tenutious D" about Jon Tenuta, who Miles had allegedly already selected to be his Defensive Coordinator. That's how much smoke there was as of when I left this morning indicating that that would come true.
I was only gone an hour or so, and I come back and scan the message boards to find that a giant space chicken may have just dropped the mother of all eggs onto the Dewey estate.
According to Rivals.com board moderators, it looks like LSU decided to play last-second hardball and that Miles has just signed an extension to stay at LSU.
These are tumultuous times, and I don't think we're going to know for sure what is going on until later today or tomorrow, but it looks like the odds of Les Miles being Michigan's next coach just swung from about 95% to about 5% over the span of the past hour.
But, if nothing else, this is the rich drama of sports, even off the field. It could be that this is a done deal and we need to move on to someone else, or it could still be just one bad source stirring up a heap of trouble and things could still swing back around.
Either way, sit back, buckle up, and (try to) enjoy the ride...
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