2006 College Football Coaching Changes

We want to keep you posted on the 2006 college football coaching changes. This is one of the keys to being a successful handicapper this fall and you must constantly keep appraised of what is happening week in and week out.

Their were a total of 23 schools which entered the 2005 season with new head coaches last year (see Wednesday's Notes in the archives on how they fared). There were only 10 new hires this year but then with the tragic death of Northwestern's Randy Walker over the summer, this year's "coaching carousel" grew to 11. In a special weekend edition of Ness Notes, I'll preview all 11 schools and coaches.

The 23 coaching changes of last year broke down like this. There were 10 schools bringing in coaches with previous experience and 13 schools which were giving their 'guys' their first head coaching job at the Division I-A level. Among this year's group of 11 changes, just two schools have hired guys with previous head coaching experience.

The short list includes Dan Hawkins, who left Boise State to take the Colorado job and Dennis Erickson, who's had numerous college and NFL jobs (most recently as the 49ers head coach) and this year makes a return visit to Idaho (coached there from 1982-85). What follows is this year coaching changes, listed alphabetically by school.

Boise State (Chris Peterson): Peterson has been Boise's OC the last five years and he's been an integral part of a team that's averaged 41.3 PPG during that span, including an impressive 48.9 PPG in 2004. While the school's best-known as a passing team, it should be noted that the Broncos have ranked in the top-25 nationally in rushing yards for three of the last four years. Boise saw two 31-game winning streaks end in last year's 9-4 (6-5-1) season.

It's 31-game WAC winning streak ended on November 12 at Fresno State (27-7) and the school's 31-game home winning streak ended in the MPC Bowl, when Boston College held on the beat the Broncos on their famed "Blue Turf", 27-21. Since 1999, the Broncos are 45-2 SU at home and 30-11 ATS. Looking ahead to this year's schedule, Boise opens at home on a Thursday night with Oregon State (note: Boise is 1-10 SU and 2-6-1 ATS all-time vs Pac-10 schools).

Other tough spots will be at Utah on 9/30, a home rematch with Fresno State on November 1 (prior to LY's loss, Boise was 4-0 SU and ATS vs Fresno since 2001, outscoring them 166-84)and at Nevada on November 21 (Wolf Pack tied with Boise for last year's WAC title at 7-1 and have gone 10-2 SU at home in 2004 and 2005). There's little reason to believe that the Broncos will miss a beat with Peterson in charge.

Buffalo (Turner Gill): Gill spent 17 years at Nebraska as its QB (three years) and then in various roles as an assistant. The Cornhuskers record during that time was 176-38. So Buffalo will certainly be a "shock to the system." The Bulls joined Division I-A in 1999 and have won a total of just 10 games, never winning more than two MAC games in any year. After an 0-11 1999 season, the team won twice in 2000 and three time in 2002 before going a combined 5-41 (18-25-1) these last four seasons.

Last year's 1-10 team (6-5 ATS) averaged a meager 10 PPG while allowing 29.7 PPG. However that total was down from the three previous seasons, in which the defense allowed 31.9, 37.1 and 34.7 PPG. Turner will be installing new schemes on both sides of the ball this year and has the second-fewest returning starters of any MAC team, so don't expect too much more from Buffalo this year.

Two games of note are the team's opener on August 31 at home vs Temple and an October 21 visit to Ohio U. In Temple, the Bison face a team which went 0-11 last year and will bring a 12-game losing streak into the game and Ohio is coached by Frank Solich. Solich is a former Nebraska player and long-time assistant plus was the team's head coach from 1998 through 2003 and Gill worked as one of his assistants during that time.

Colorado (Dan Hawkins): Hawkins spent the last five years at Boise State compiling an impressive 53-10 mark. His .841 winning percentage is No. 1 among active coaches and his 53 wins are fourth-most ever by a coach in his first five seasons at a major school. He dominated the WAC while at Boise, going 37-3 and winning four league titles.

He takes over a Colorado team which has won three Big-12 North titles in the last four seasons but one which has nowhere near the talent of Big-12 South powers Texas and Oklahoma. Hawkins is a great hire but he has just five returning starters on offense and anywhere from six to eight on defense. The Buffs open with Montana State but then face Colorado State on September 9.

The favorite in this game is just 1-9 ATS the last 10 years and it's back at a neutral site (Invesco Field) after two consecutive years of playing in Boulder (Colorado won both games by three points in non-covers). Colorado visits Georgia on September 23 (Hawkins took Boise there last year and lost 48-13!) plus plays in Norman on October 21 and Lincoln on November 24.

Idaho (Dennis Erickson): Erickson is just 40-56 in six seasons as an NFL head coach (four years with the Seahawks and two with the 49ers). However, he's 145-56-1 in the college ranks with stops in Idaho, Wyoming, Washington State, Miami and Oregon State. He won two national titles in Miami and led Oregon State to an 11-1 season and BCS Bowl (41-9 Fiesta Bowl win over Notre Dame) in 2000.

In his second tour of duty at Idaho, he takes over a team that's gone 11-47 these last five years and 23-29-2 ATS. Erickson has wanted to get back in the college ranks since being fired by the 49ers in 2004 but many schools shied away because of his past problems with the NCAA. However, this was a "no-brainer" for Idaho, which brings in a "big-name" coach. Erickson will take his Vandals to Pullman on September 9 to face Washington State (he coached there from 1987-88) and to Corvallis on September 23 to play Oregon State (1999-2002).

Middle Tennessee State (Rick Stockstill): Stockstill has been a 17-year assistant at the Division I-A level, 14 years at Clemson (under Danny Ford, Ken Hatfield, Tommy West and Tommy Bowden). He's spent the last two years at South Carolina, under Lou Holtz and Steve Spurrier. He takes over a team that many felt was as talented as any team in the SBC last year but the Blue Raiders went just 4-7. In fact, the team is just 17-29 (21-23) the last four years.

The team hung tough at both Alabama and North Carolina State last year and went into Vanderbilt and beat the Commodores 17-15, a loss that kept Vandy from its first bowl bid since 1982. Nine offensive starters return and I wouldn't be surprised if the Blue Raiders posted their first winning record since going 8-3 in 2001. However, the Blue Raiders may have to pull off an upset in one of these games to pull that off. They are at Maryland (9/9), at Oklahoma (9/23), in Nashville to meet Louisville (10/6) and at South Carolina (11/18).

Sunday's notes continues my preview of CFB's 2006 coaching carousel. Listed below are six of 2006's new head coaches and the teams they'll lead. See yesterday's notes for the other five.

Kansas State (Ron Prince): Prince is just 36 years old and has never been a head coach at any level (Division I-A assistant these last five years). He was the OC at Virginia most recently and he's known as a great recruiter. He's got big shoes to fill, as Bill Snyder stepped down last year after a remarkable career at Manhattan.

Snyder took over arguably the worst program in the nation back in 1989 and then led the Wildcats to 11 straight bowl games from 1993 through 2003, contending for the national title in four seasons. However, the Wildcats have gone 4-7 and 5-6 these last two seasons, so Prince's timing is pretty good. He's got 17 returning starters and a quick look at the schedule shows his team could easily open 5-1.

The Wildcats open the year with four consecutive home games and get to play Illinois State, Florida Atlantic and Marshall in Manhattan before Louisville comes to town on September 30. They then open their Big-12 schedule with a visit to Baylor and another home game with Oklahoma State. Snyder didn't lead the Wildcats to a bowl game until his fifth season at Kansas State but it's likely Prince will do so in his first year at Manhattan.

Northwestern (Pat Fitzgerald): Randy Walker was about to enter his eighth season as head coach of the Wildcats in 2006. His career record at Northwestern was just 37-46 (41-37-2 ATS) but he had led the Wildcats to three bowls during his first seven years in Evanston, including a Sun Bowl appearance last season against UCLA. The Wildcats had taken on one of the nation's toughest schedules last year and still went 7-5. Even with the loss of QB Brett Basanez, a workable September schedule and 13 returning starters (including super sophomore RB Tyrell Sutton) made it likely the Wildcats would be bowl-eligible again this year.

Then came the sudden death of Walker and on July 7, the naming of 31-year-old Pat Fitzgerald as the team's new head coach. Fitzgerald was a star on the school's two Big-10 title teams of the mid 90s and becomes the youngest coach in Division I-A this year. Who really knows how the program will react but as mentioned earlier, the Wildcats do an a chance to start fast. They open at Walker's old school Miami-Ohio on August 31 and then play home games against New Hampshire and Eastern Michigan. If the team can settle on a QB by then, a Friday night visit to Reno to play Nevada (10-2 at home these last two years), is winnable.

The Big-10 schedule comes next, opening with road games at Penn State and Wisconsin. I'm not sure the team can match it's 5-3 league mark of last year, so opening at least 3-1 (4-0 would be nice) is a must. It will be hard not to root for Fitzgerald and the Wildcats this year.

Rice (Todd Graham): Graham was the DC at Tulsa these last three years, working under Steve Kragthorpe. All Tulsa did in the last three years is go from seasons of 1-10 and 1-11 in 2001 and 2002 to 8-5 in '03 (bowl appearance) plus after a 4-8 year in '04, to 9-4 last year. Last year's team won the C-USA title game and the Liberty Bowl, 31-24 over Fresno State. Graham takes over for Ken Hatfield, who produced just three winning seasons in 12 years.

Rice has some of the most stringent academic standards for its athletes of any Division I-A school, so it's not surprising the school's last bowl appearance came in 1961. Graham has brought in former Texas QB Major Applewhite as his OC and this run-oriented team will try to install a passing offense. Pass offenses with option personnel rarely work, so expect Rice to struggle this year. However, since the team went 1-10 (3-8 ATS) in 2005, things can't get much worse.

Rice opens with cross-town rival Houston on September 2 and if the Owls lose that one (are 9-23 against the Cougars), they'll likely open 0-4, at least. The Owls follow their season-opener with a trip to UCLA, a game with Texas at Reliant Stadium and a visit to Tallahassee to play Florida State. Rice has averaged more than 100 YPG through the air just two times since 2000, averaging 122 YPG in 2001 and a meager 103 YPG last year. This will take awhile.

San Diego State (Chuck Long): Long is best remembered for finishing a close second to Bo Jackson in the 1985 Heisman race. However, he's spent the last 11 years as an assistant, first at Iowa (his alma mater) and recently at Oklahoma, where he was first the QB coach and then the team's OC. He takes over for Tom Craft, who led the Aztecs to a 19-29 record these last four years (22-21-2 ATS). San Diego State last had a winning season in 1998, finishing 7-5 (including a 20-13 Las Vegas Bowl loss to North Carolina).

Long is a good hire for this underachieving program which is the only MWC team since the conference's inception in 1999 that's not gone to a bowl game. Lynell Hamilton (if healthy?) is a talented RB and QB O'Connell should get better under Long's direction. The defense should be much better this year and last year's team was better than its 5-7 mark (outscored conference foes by 22 points). It would be no surprise if the Aztecs were to make it to 7-5 in 2006.

Temple (Al Golden): While UVa's OC Ron Prince takes over at Kansas State, its DC Al Golden, takes over the job at Temple (I'd rather be Ron!). Temple will again play as an independent, moving to the MAC in 2007. Temple is coming off a year in which it went 0-11 and got outscored by an average of 45-10 but the Owls actually went 5-6 ATS in 2005 (now that's trick!). Bobby Wallace went 19-71 in his eight years at Temple, so Golden doesn't exactly have big shoes to fill.

Consider this fact, Temple has not had a winning season in 15 years and has not even topped four wins in a season since 1990. This year's schedule will again be tough but it can't be any worse than last year's, as nine of the team's 11 opponents were bowl-eligible by season's end. Temple averaged a pathetic 9.7 PPG on offense and allowed a dreadful 45.3 PPG on defense. I guess the good news is that only two starters return on the defensive side of the ball.

Temple visits Buffalo (see Buffalo write-up in Part 1) to open the season on August 31 and if the Owls don't win there, the next best chance at a win won't come until a home game with Kent State (1-10 in 2005) on October 7. Wins should be few (and possibly far between) in 2006 but there may be a couple of wins for Golden in his first year.

Wisconsin (Brett Bielema): Like Prince at Kansa State (Bill Snyder), Bielema takes over at Wisconsin for the school's most successful head coach, Barry Alaverz. If not for the sudden hiring of Fitzgerald at Northwestern, Bielema (at 36 years-old), would have the youngest Big-10 coach this season, by 15 years!

Alvarez led the Badgers to 11 bowls in his 17 years, going 8-3 in those games and 118-73-4 in his tenure. Bielema is his hand-picked successor and while he'll have an experienced defense back, the offense loses eight starters from a squad that averaged a school-record 34.3 PPG in 2005. Brain Calhoun is the biggest loss (1636 rushing yards / 571 receiving yards / 24 TDs) but QB John Stocco is back.

Wisconsin needs to start fast, opening with Bowling Green in Cleveland on September 2 (LY's score was 56-42 Wisconsin!) and then home to Western Michigan plus San Diego State. The Badgers open Big-10 play with a road game at Michigan but then play at Indiana plus home to Northwestern and Minnesota. It would come as no surprise if the Badgers start 5-1 this year. Wisconsin won't win 10 games like last year but a winning record and a bowl bid is likely.

Make sure you factor in these coaching changes before making any college football picks this fall.