I guess we'll see if there is any improvement in the team's performance the rest of the way.
I take back everything I said...
- Thread starter pboiler18
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I guess we'll see if there is any improvement in the team's performance the rest of the way.
That's what he said and I took him at his word. Obviously I'll be more cautious about that going forward.
I said since his hire that the coach Hazell reminded me most of was John Wooden at UCLA. Ultra-under-control, quiet, thoughtful, professional. But, what worked in the 60s with assistants like Denny Crum and an environment where ANYBODY would love to go to college (Southern California), doesn't work in 2016 with a lousy coaching staff and somewhere that few young people want to "flock" to - the cornfields of Indiana.
Ha
Either way probably won't affect us drastically. Idk.
I think nat mentioned before a positive to waiting was that it showed a future candidate that the Ad would not be preemptive or unfair to someone.
Although a counterpoint could be that firing early also shows a future candidate that the Ad will not be long term plotting for change behind his back either.
I can tell you I've encountered a number of opinions from people looking from the outside that couldn't figure out why we fired him at 3-3. Obviously, these people aren't watching the games but that's the impression they had. Dakich mentioned it either via twitter or on his show. I've read it on other message boards. I've had Notre Dame fans I work with ask me about it.
Talent is our biggest issue. x1000
Sure, that leads back to the head coach....but now that he's gone we aren't going to get more talented over the next 6 games. Say coaching gets way better....great. With the talent defecit we have...it doesnt matter.
That's all I was arguing. In the long run, we'll be absolutely better without Hazell. For the next 6 games, highly unlikely.
Can't argue with you there...in the end we all want to see a competitor team that at least shows some grit and a desire to win week in and week out....have there been moments of that in that in the last 3 1/2 years? A few...but not enough, for me, change couldn't wait...here's to hoping it works out for the best! BTFU.
The tangible benefit is something you cannot see - what is going on behind the scenes. Sure, you can argue other external things, but it's all arguable.
However, if you currently have a head coach, you can only do very limited things behind the scenes. You can't go to donors to get financial backing for investments in coaching salaries - because that can't get out. If it does, you are screwed. And with a brand new athletic director, they don't necessarily have those relationships built up.
When you don't have to hide what you're doing, it makes things a A LOT more efficient and easier. That alone for a school like Purdue is a big deal.
Was today's game a tangible enough amount of evidence for you?
Honestly, did you ever play or coach football? How could you not see the improvement from the players emotional standpoint alone...let alone Purdue appeared to make schematic changes led by Parker's instructions (defense played much more 4-3 today with effectiveness to hold Nebraska at half. Nebraska is simply the better team and made good adjustments. Purdue made adjustments but they took hold too late in the game to matter.
The defense did play better today, at least for the first half (after the first play). Still think people are making WAY too much out of a 27-14 loss where we were outscored 17-0 in the 2nd half. I read the comments before the game and realized the Fire-Hazell-Now crowd had set a ridiculously low bar for what they would count as a good performance but come on. We basically got the team to play hard for one half after firing a coach and it sure didn't carry into the second half. We'll see what happens next week.
In previous years, this game would have played out one of two ways:
1: Purdue would have been absolutely blasted to the tune of a 30-40 point loss. The announcers even said as much and were quite surprised that it didn't happen (see Maryland game).
2: Purdue gets down 21-28 points and the opposition puts in their second/third string players or the team clearly coasts and allows Purdue to crawl back in to striking distance (see MSU 2014 and 2015 or Iowa 2016).
This was the first game since Hazell took control that a game against a respectable opponent didn't occur as explained above.
We only lost by 3 at MSU last year and they made the college football playoffs.
Look at the explanation I put down for point #2. Did that game not play out that exact same way? Michigan was up 21-0 at half with Purdue literally doing nothing on offense and MSU totally controlling both sides of the lines. The second half literally plays out exactly as I explained it usually does. MSU totally coasted and got themselves in trouble.
So the fact that we actually had late 4th qtr opportunities to win the MSU game is irrelevant because Nebraska took us easy to start the game instead of after they were up 3 scores? I guess I'd rather have the chance to win the game than a coach in tears going into halftime of a game we'd eventually lose by 13 after getting shutout in the 2nd half.
Again, it is a perception of the team we are discussing. The team appeared to be better prepared, more in tune to the game, had less boneheaded mistakes, played looser, and had fun. Those are things that can clearly hold a team back when playing. Nebraska, at times, struggled against Purdue to do what they wanted to do. That hasn't happened all too often for extended amounts of times in game the last four years. The fact that you can't see that and see how this game clearly went in a different direction, is quite frankly, beyond me. Either you are simply ignoring the positives from firing Hazell mid-season to make positives strides to salvage the season for a bowl game or you are just grumpy and need a better nap schedule.
Like I said before, I'm not digging a hole to set the bar for improvement like some of you are willing to do. I think some of you were willing to tout the vast improvement just for us showing up to the game on time all wearing the same uniform. Anything beyond that has you bouncing off walls.
It was one half of competitive football. They didn't come back out and back it up in the second half at all. Hopefully we get a good full-game effort against Penn State but I'm not holding my breath and I'm not going to celebrate just being close for part of the game .
To correct slightly, they came out and got a stop on defense and Blough hit his first 5 passes of the second half. After the ridiculous no call on the late hit, Blough wasn't the same and the changes Nebraska made took hold and they got a run of points from the mid way part of the 3rd quarter to the start of the 4th quarter. After that, Purdue obviously made changes and took hold defensively again but the offense stalled out. If the offense is able to score on the first possession of the second half when Blough takes the obvious late hit, it is a completely different ball game.
