Flowers4Heisman

I'm just curious. In terms of football facilities, does anyone know how we stack up against Florida, FSU, Miami?

Ours has got to be better than the gnats, right?

Dear Santa: I've been sort of good this year... Please bring Randy Shannon to USF!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randy_Shannon

Randy Shannon currently the linebacker coach at TCU. (age 46)

During Shannon's six years as UM's defensive coordinator, his defenses ranked as follows in total defense nationally:

2001 – 6th

2002 – 7th

2003 – 2nd

2004 – 28th

2005 – 4th

2006 – 7th

Here's what I didn't like:

Leavitt: Had no money for assistants and then he didn't recruit well enough in the later years. And he never upgraded the assistants. He basically operated out of the same paradigm that brought USF out of the minor leagues. Sure, we got to #2 and all of that, but that's like taking a Pinto and redlining it. You can get it going pretty good --for about ten minutes. Why no Big East titles? The old Pinto of a program couldn't get it done on the highway.

Holtz: Bad assistants. Couldn't recruit. Couldn't motivate players. To be honest, he probably would have done much better at Notre Dame or some place like that. It's a completely different sort of program here at USF.

Coach Taggart, here's what I'm hanging my hat on:

1) Jim Harbaugh's magic. I hope he learned everything that made Jim Harbaugh successful and brought it to USF.

2) He chooses excellent assistants.

3) He can get us the players that we need to win.

USF hasn't been a better program because the last two coaches didn't have everything working. All the major programs in the country have all the cylinders running. It's never been done at USF up to this point in time.

My biggest fear about Coach Taggart? He's so young and only knows other young coaches and so his staff is going to lack that veteran experience. Everybody is worrying about this recruiting class, etc. Me, I'm most concerned about who he chooses to be on his staff. If he fills it with a bunch of people all under 30 years old, we are all going to be in for a long bus ride!

I was there when USF football started on the old soccer stadium...

It's been heartbreaking to see what's happened to the program since the Leavitt fiasco.

Finally, everything is looking bright, again. Somehow, the Harbaugh connection completes the circle for me (Coach Taggart, Jim Harbaugh, and Jim Leavitt). I'm finally feeling closure after three years.

Plus, there were two important moves made by USF:

1) Having the guts to fire Lou Holtz Jr.

2) Willing to rebuild USF football properly. We are not an SEC school, and we are not a mid-west school.

USF could have gone wrong in so many ways with this hire:

Here's why I LOVE the Willie Taggart hire.

1) He's young. You need that energy at USF. It's a tough, tough place to win without the extra hard work.

2) He's been trained properly. Whatever magic that Jack Harbaugh and Jim Harbaugh have, Coach Taggert has been witnessed to it.

3) He's been a head coach where he had to turn it around from the ground. Great experience.

4) Recruiting!

5) He's got character. I've watched a bunch of his videos on Youtube and I like him a lot.

What Coach Taggart needs is a great staff. He can't do it alone, and this is not WKU. He can't bring everybody with him and expect to succeed here.

Read this. It will say a lot. http://www.wkusports...TCLID=204838864

I'm proud USF athletics is finally doing something right about USF football.

By the way, everybody is worrying about the sinking Big East and USF getting an invite to better pastures. Well, winning football will help a great deal. This hire is a huge step in the right direction.