Miami last had an All American in 2005. That's stunning in its own right, but I thought I'd look at what happened in the years since. I tried to get it all right but probably botched a kid or two here or there, but here's what I found. From 2006 -- 2019:
- 83 different teams had at least one AA. (I’m counting AA seasons, so a kid who makes it two years in a row counts as two AA seasons for his school.)
- In Florida, FSU, UF, FAU, USF and UCF all have had one.
- In the ACC, every team other than Miami and VT have had AA s over this stretch -- viz., FSU, Clemson, Virginia, NCST, UNC, Duke, GA Tech, BC, Syracuse, Louisville, Pitt
- Alabama destroys everyone else, with 35 AAs over this period. Next were Oklahoma, LSU and Ohio State with 16 each.
- After this group, the next group included Clemson, FSU, Texas, Wisconsin, Stanford, A&M and Michigan, all with 10 or more.
- In the 5-9 range, you had Oklahoma State, Florida, Baylor, USC, Missouri, Iowa, Georgia, Notre Dame and Utah (7-9 each) followed by Oregon, Arkansas, TCU, Penn State, Auburn, UCLA and Michigan St. (5-6 each).
- Schools with 3-4 each were Boston College, Arizona, Texas Tech, Tenn., Oregon St., Arizona St., Memphis, Washington, Ole Miss, Wash. St., Kentucky and Cal
- The following schools all have had 2 AAs since Miami last had one: Colorado, Purdue, Boise St., South Carolina, Illinois, Pitt, Colorado St., Kansas St., Louisville, San Diego St., Houston, NCST, Wake, Cincy, WVA, Nebraska and Duke.
- The following schools all have had an AA since Miami last had one: Toledo, Northern Illinois, Western Michigan, Temple, LA Tech, Kent St., Tulane, Vanderbilt, Wake Forest, UCF, USF, FAU, Idaho, BYU, New Mexico, Massachusetts, Indiana, Fresno St., Syracuse, Utah State, GA Tech, Minnesota, North Carolina and Virginia.
I'm interested to hear theories on this. Our coaching and schemes may be bad, but kids from 83 schools made AA over this period! Kids from obscure schools made it.
It may be improbable that any given kid makes AA. But over 14 years, we're zero for every kid we suited up - that cannot be probable. Oklahoma St. has had 9 AAs in this period. Missouri, Iowa and Utah posted 7 each during this period. USC, which has also been bad, has had 8. UCLA had 5. Arizona and Tennessee had 4, Arizona State and Memphis had 3, as did Kentucky, California and Washington State. Illinois, Wake Forest and Duke have had 2!
I think there are a few things going on here: (a) obviously, poor evaluations left us with too little top level talent; (b) what talent we've had has too often left early, missing the chance to accomplish a lot on the field; (c) some of our kids didn't put out the effort they should have, either because they were too NFL focused on believed the hype about them that fan boards provided; and (d) our staffs didn't help put kids in a position to succeed. However, placing the explanation all on (d) sounds like deep denial when the numbers are this stark. Kids from other schools succeeded in touch circumstances.
How can it be this bad? We had 5 AAs in the 1950s, 10 in the 1960s, 10 in the 1970s, 16 in the 1980s, 18 in the 1990s and 22 from 2000--2005. Then, none. Zero. Zilch. Zip. Nada.
