StevieRayBull

Bad day for USF's former head coach. https://www.si.com/college/2021/11/26/skip-holtz-fired-louisiana-tech-football-coaching-search

Needing improvement isn't the same as having nothing. When Taggart took over, the cupboard was bare. This is not that situation. We have some good skill position players returning (Joiner, Evans, Ford) and some good players on defense (Hampton, Sails, Boyles, Yates). We need to get more talent, especially on the o-line, but it's absurd to pretend next year's team has no talent.

The cupboard is not bare at USF, either.

Conference affiliation is not unimportant, but I think it's clouding everyone's thoughts too much nowadays. This article was fair in it's discussion of conference affiliation, but our interest as fans in the program shouldn't be dominated by this. USF just needs to be worried about winning the games it plays and the rest will take care of itself. Better conference affiliation could help us with recruiting, but it's not the end all. If we were moving up from 1-AA, I'd be more worried about our recruiting position, but our place in the state right now is good enough to attract whatever recruits we'll need. All this conference affiliation talk is mostly high school-type drama and politics. I'd rather be the guy who goes about his business and isn't worried about being "popular" with the other conferences. In the end, he'll be a great success. I think Boise State has been the best example of this in recent history. Granted, they're playing the conference game too, but if I were a Boise fan, I'd be happy with the coaching and program rising based on success on the field. Again, I understand that conference affiliation isn't irrelevant, but I'm not going to sweat over what we can't control or make too big a deal of it. What we can control is winning the games on our schedule, and I think we have the coach to do that.

Yes.

This guy shows the power of Taggart as a recruiter. What was more impressive before he committed to USF was his commitment to WKU when he had a bunch of BCS and SEC offers.

Many people on this thread have been specifically talking about size, and associating it with the ability to run a pro-style offense. That's why I posted. Obviously we want the best lineman no matter which offense we run. Running a spread or a pro-style will not keep us from getting the best players. Winning or losing matters to recruits more than the style.

This idea that we have to have giant offensive lineman to run a pro-style offense is being exaggerated: http://www.sportsnola.com/sports/sports-blogs/rene-nadeau/585378-size-matters-sometimes-a-look-at-college-footballs-offensive-lines.html The average difference between a BE line and and SEC line was only 7 lbs, and the reason they're bigger is mostly because they train to be. The offense dictates lineman size more than lineman size dictates offense. We can run a pro-style offense with no problem, just some adjustments. WKU had the 23rd heaviest line in all college football heading into this year. WKU! If they can recruit and train big linemen at Western Kentucky, we can do it at USF. I'd like to see us run a pro-style offense and I think we can do it.

My vote goes to Taggart. He's got the Harbaugh coaching mentality, which means he'll make our defense stop being soft. Whoever the next coach is needs to make us more physical and bring back a good defense to USF. FYI about Nutt's alleged affair: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=2841224 It was all rumors based on texts between numbers, not based on any actual messages.

Former USF pitcher Kevin Quackenbush got a nod in today's SI article about prospects from the Arizona Fall League. Way to represent Kevin! http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/writers/tom_verducci/11/20/arizona-fall-league-top-prospects/index.html?eref=sihp&sct=hp_t12_a0

I agree with you on this.

"Competing our tails off"

You're right. This thread should be titled "Holtz' lack of reaction to penalties"

In the FSU game, Lattimore made a stupid personal foul penalty on a third down play came up short and would have resulted in a punt. When the camera showed him next to Holtz on the sideline, Holtz was listening to him justify his penalty. Against Temple, Marcus Shaw had a personal foul call that cost our defense major field position on a punt. When he came to the sidelines he was smiling and the players were high-fiving him. Then they showed him talking next to a calm and consoling Holtz. I've never seen Holtz hold a player accountable. He always just listens and gives pats on the back. I've never seen him get on Daniels after he makes dumb interceptions. Holtz always thinks his team is giving a great effort, but he doesn't demand anything from them. He doesn't push them to be any better than they already are. We have a talented and experienced team, but the player's are only living up to their personal standards, when they need a coach to show them how to raise the bar. That's my two cents.

I think you nailed it Pete.

What I want out of this season is for Skip Holtz to realize how much he needs to re-evaluate his idea of what makes a good team. We've heard so many positive things the last two training camps, never anything negative. I think he believes his positive assessments. At some point he needs to realize that positive reinforcement needs to happen, but he needs to be demanding of his players as well. I think he's right in his assessment of the talent, but wrong in his motivation. I still like Skip, but I hope this season opens his eyes.

Yes. It has to be.

You're right. I thought we had a lot of emphasis on fundamentals and communication in camp. Guess it didn't take or wasn't taught very well. That was one of the worst tackling performances I've seen from us.

This is a great idea.

I can appreciate wanting to establish the running game and therefore I'm all for coming out and pounding the ground game, but why did we do that when they started putting eight and nine in the box? It seems like Fitch wanted to make a statement to our offense at the expense of calling a live game. A couple passes here and there to keep the linebackers honest would have helped. Instead, we end up with three. A touchdown would have kept this game tied at the end. This isn't to say that the first drive was the reason we lost. We have many problems, but this drive was just an example of why we're not good in general. I'm not sure what's going on in the minds of our coaching staff.

I agree. It's nice to sober up at the beginning of the season for once.

I'm still willing to give Cosh a little time, but I couldn't believe how many third and 10+ yards we let them convert. Our D-line has generally played well against the run, but we aren't getting nearly the pressure we should on passing downs. Our defensive ends are disappointing me in that area.

You're spot on in your analysis of his thought process. He's not a QB. He's an athlete.

I agree with y'all. My favorite combination. Hope to see less white helmets as well.