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Miami Looking Back To The Butch Davis Era's Recipe For Success
The University of Miami is in the middle of a coaching search and the search committee is wisely reaching out to many of the players and coaches that were affiliated with the program during the Butch Davis era.
The Davis era saw Miami reach new heights as the Hurricanes assembled a talented team that wasn’t full of the brash attitude that existed with the team in the 1980s and early 1990s.
The UM program was clean, competitive, and extremely talented during the Davis era and that time produced multiple star players and successful coaches that went on to climb the ladder.
In the last decade of Miami football, and particularly the Al Golden era, the UM program has gotten away from what made it a juggernaut in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
The following is a look at what made the Hurricanes successful during that time and what the search committee can learn as they look for qualities in the next head coach that can bring Miami back to national prominence.
Recruiting Expertise
The acquisition of talent is the most important aspect of a college coach and UM’s recruiting success from 1995-2001 was arguably the most successful recruiting run by a program all time. The Hurricanes recruited and developed 21 first round picks during that time.
That era saw local stars like Edgerrin James, Sanatana Moss, Andre Johnson, Willis McGahee, Vince Wilfork, Dan Morgan, Mike Rumph, Phillip Buchanon, Jonathan Vilma, Sean Taylor, Vernon Carey, William Joseph and Antrel Rolle to name a few. Miami supplemented those local stars with national level recruits and the UM program took off.
Miami coach Al Golden and his staff really struggled with making the transition from recruiting Temple level talent to recruiting at a top-level program like UM. When Golden first arrived at UM, he struggled to understand that he needed to put a strong emphasis on landing most of his players from South Florida. Golden stuck to his recruiting base in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Virginia. There were too many players that Golden did land in South Florida that were not talented enough to stick on the UM roster.
UM’s next head coach must be an elite recruiter and talent evaluator. The recipe for success at Miami is simple: if you land your fair share of the top recruits in South Florida, you can compete for championships. Miami’s next head coach must put the fence around South Florida and get the best players to stay closer to home. Bringing in a coach that can evaluate and recruit the top players in South Florida is the number one factor in success. Players win games and stacking talented recruiting classes on top of each other year after year hasn’t been achieved at Miami in a long time.
Putting Together a Top Coaching Staff
When Davis was at the helm of the UM program from 1995-2000, the Hurricanes had a top notch coaching staff full of assistants that went on to climb the coaching ladder after their tenure in Coral Gables.
The ultimate goal when a head coach puts his staff together is to get a group of coaches that will have great success and move on. A head coach should want his coordinators to eventually move on and become a head coach at another program. Position coaches should be expected to have the ability to eventually become a coordinator. That type of upward mobility indicates great success that was achieved within a specific staff.
Davis’ coaching staff at Miami in 2000 featured three future NFL coaches in defensive coordinator Greg Schiano, defensive backs coach Chuck Pagano, and tight ends coach Rob Chudzinski. The wide receivers coach at that time, Curtis Johnson, has climbed the coaching ladder and is now the head coach at Tulane. Davis’ graduate assistant in 2000 was Mario Cristobal. That is a lot of smart football coaches in a room and while that type of success can’t be expected to be duplicated, Miami needs to raise the level of their coaching staff.
Top level coaching staffs goes beyond the Davis era as well. Davis comes from the Jimmy Johnson coaching tree, which produced many future head coaches as well. Davis was a defensive line coach at UM from 1984-88. Also on Johnson’s staff at Miami was Dave Wannstedt at defensive coordinator, Dave Campo as the defensive backs coach, Gary Stevens as offensive coordinator, and Tony Wise as an offensive line coach. Tommy Tuberville was a graduate assistant on that coaching staff.
Miami coach Al Golden lost the top two assistants he had at UM early in his tenure in offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch, who went on to have the same position with the Jacksonville Jaguars, and wide receivers coach George McDonald, who went on to be an offensive coordinator at Syracuse. The majority of the assistants that Golden has had on staff either followed him from Temple or were largely under-qualified with little experience to be coaching at a program at the level of Miami.
Golden’s ego got in the way of putting together a strong coaching staff. Golden put a bunch of yes men around him on the coaching staff and while that may lead to strong friendships among the coaches, it isn’t the best environment for success. A good head coach is not afraid to put a group of top football minds around him that will challenge him and aren’t afraid to bring their own ideas to the table.
The coaching staff under Al Golden was one of the worst by a team in any of the power five conferences. Miami needs to get back to having top coordinators and position coaches that can develop players and put their players in positions to have success. When Miami is successful, the Hurricanes have a head coach that wants a top notch coaching staff around him.
Bringing Back The Miami Culture
There is no other way to say it: the University of Miami football team got soft during the Al Golden era. When Miami was at its best, there was always top-level competition at practices during the season, during offseason workouts, and during tough moments in games. Miami lost that edge during the Golden era and it all starts with the culture that was established and the type of players that were brought into the program.
If players or coaches from Miami’s successful years witnessed UM practices from recent years, they would be shocked. The practices became too easy, too soft, and became more about skill development than competition. Golden’s practices were conducted like their primary objective was about not getting injured rather than promoting competition and toughness.
At their height, Miami’s program was notorious for having players that were some of the hardest workers in the country. That was the standard the coaching staff set. If a wide receiver was out grinding on his own in the offseason, the rest of the receivers better match or surpass that intensity level or they would be passed up on the depth chart. During the Al Golden era, the players rarely used the jugs machine after practice and when they did it was more of a time to joke than improve their hands.
When Miami was at its best, they have a culture that breeds a natural high level of competition. When UM was at their pinnacle, the coaching staff could drop a high level talent in that culture and watch that competition squeeze the most out of that player. That culture didn’t exist at Miami during the Al Golden era. Over the past five seasons, it has been acceptable to “do what the coaches tell us.” Players no longer do the extra work you would routinely see after practice when the Hurricanes were at their peak. Players were encouraged to work hard in the offseason, but not to do too much on their own. The program developed a culture of just doing enough to get by rather than pushing themselves to attain new heights.
The UM program has seen a lack of player development and have seen their players go on to the NFL and have better careers there than they did at Miami. Some of that can be attributed to poor coaching, but a lot of it is attributed to the weak culture that Miami has fostered in recent years. In recent years, players that come from Miami are pushed harder once they arrive in the cutthroat environment that exists at the NFL level. That type of competitive environment used to exist at UM.
Miami has become a mentally weak program under Golden and it has manifested on the field. Throughout the Al Golden era, the Hurricanes have been poor in games in which they play against competitive teams and have not finished any season on a strong note. Miami has been thrashed against talented teams like Clemson and North Carolina in 2015, Louisville and FSU in 2013, and Notre Dame and Kansas State in 2012. Miami was physically whipped and mentally fragile in all of those blowout losses. From 2011-14, the Hurricanes have a cumulative record of 7-9 in the final four games of each of those seasons and UM did not win any bowl games.
Particularly on defense, Golden neutered what makes the UM program great and South Florida recruits special—he took away the ability of the players to go make plays. Golden and his coaching staff preferred a player to do his assignment and let the play come to him. Defensive players routinely said that they “trust the coaches” to put them in positions to make plays. They waited for the plays to come to them rather than just go make the plays themselves.
The best example of this mentality happened in 2013 when Miami beat Virginia 45-26 at home. Miami’s first score of the game came on an interception returned for a touchdown by cornerback Tracy Howard on the very first play of the game. Howard returned the pick 19 yards for a touchdown that gave the Hurricanes a quick 7-0 lead and immediately established what type of game UVA was in for. When Howard returned to the sideline following that play, rather than being congratulated for making a tremendous play to open the game, he received an earful from defensive coordinator Mark D’Onofrio for free-lancing on the play. Miami’s defense used to pride itself on making plays. The Al Golden defense wanted its players to be robots in a bend but don’t break passive system.
During the 1995-2000 era, the Miami defense was the identity of the team. Under Golden, that identity became soft and passive.
Miami once had a culture that made it unique and special in the college football landscape. The next UM head coach needs to recapture that winning, competitive culture that embraces players who want to play fast and make plays. That culture has a history of breeding championships at UM.
Understanding the UM Landscape
The head coach at the University of Miami is one of the most unique jobs in college sports. The expectations are incredibly high, the game day fan support is not ideal, and the stadium is a 30-minute drive from campus just to name a few of the challenges.
With all that being said, the Miami program has a high ceiling and has the ability to compete at the highest level. If Miami has a coach that can accentuate their strengths that UM can offer the school will compete for National Championships. If UM wins at a high level, it will bring the fans back to the stadium. Will UM ever be able to consistently be able to sell out their games? No, but more fans will come out to games.
When Miami was having success in the 1980s, early 1990s, and 2000s, the Hurricanes only sold out the big games of the season. Poor fan support is part of the challenge at UM, but it hasn’t affected the Hurricanes from becoming a great team in the past. Recruits ideally want to play in front of a packed stadium every game, but ultimately their number one goal is to make it to the NFL. If recruits are confident that Miami’s next coach can help them achieve that goal, they will come to UM because of the strengths the school can offer.
So what does Miami offer? First of all it is in the middle of the most talented recruiting area in the country. The built in advantage that Miami has on the recruiting trail can’t be undersold. Miami, of course, is not going to land all of the top players in South Florida, but if they land their fair share they can easily average ten win seasons in the ACC.
Another big advantage Miami can offer? The school is in the city Miami—a tremendous destination city. If Miami can land a coach that gives recruits confidence that they can be developed and can get to NFL, the Hurricanes will land the top players and have success on the field. Players want to play and live in South Florida. Miami needs to hire the right coach to give recruits confidence that they can reach their potential at UM. Most Miami kids want to stay close to home.
Miami also offers a tremendous brand and history of success. When Miami is at its best, it is one of the coolest programs in the country and cool matters when it comes to recruiting the top players. Even now while Miami is mired in a decade of mediocrity, the UM brand carries some weight.
The Miami job is not easy. It is a job that has plenty of negatives, but the strengths of the program far outweigh those negatives. Miami’s next coach must understand the challenge that the UM job presents and must work towards magnifying the strengths so that the weaknesses are minimized. If Miami finds a coach that can win, it is one of the top college football jobs in the country and compete for national championships. There aren’t many jobs around the country that can offer that type of ceiling. Miami can return to being a top level team again, the school just needs to find the right coach to get them there.
Miami Looking Back To The Butch Davis Era's Recipe For Success
The University of Miami is in the middle of a coaching search and the search committee is wisely reaching out to many of the players and coaches that were affiliated with the program during the Butch Davis era.
The Davis era saw Miami reach new heights as the Hurricanes assembled a talented team that wasn’t full of the brash attitude that existed with the team in the 1980s and early 1990s.
The UM program was clean, competitive, and extremely talented during the Davis era and that time produced multiple star players and successful coaches that went on to climb the ladder.
In the last decade of Miami football, and particularly the Al Golden era, the UM program has gotten away from what made it a juggernaut in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
The following is a look at what made the Hurricanes successful during that time and what the search committee can learn as they look for qualities in the next head coach that can bring Miami back to national prominence.
Recruiting Expertise
The acquisition of talent is the most important aspect of a college coach and UM’s recruiting success from 1995-2001 was arguably the most successful recruiting run by a program all time. The Hurricanes recruited and developed 21 first round picks during that time.
That era saw local stars like Edgerrin James, Sanatana Moss, Andre Johnson, Willis McGahee, Vince Wilfork, Dan Morgan, Mike Rumph, Phillip Buchanon, Jonathan Vilma, Sean Taylor, Vernon Carey, William Joseph and Antrel Rolle to name a few. Miami supplemented those local stars with national level recruits and the UM program took off.
Miami coach Al Golden and his staff really struggled with making the transition from recruiting Temple level talent to recruiting at a top-level program like UM. When Golden first arrived at UM, he struggled to understand that he needed to put a strong emphasis on landing most of his players from South Florida. Golden stuck to his recruiting base in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Virginia. There were too many players that Golden did land in South Florida that were not talented enough to stick on the UM roster.
UM’s next head coach must be an elite recruiter and talent evaluator. The recipe for success at Miami is simple: if you land your fair share of the top recruits in South Florida, you can compete for championships. Miami’s next head coach must put the fence around South Florida and get the best players to stay closer to home. Bringing in a coach that can evaluate and recruit the top players in South Florida is the number one factor in success. Players win games and stacking talented recruiting classes on top of each other year after year hasn’t been achieved at Miami in a long time.
Putting Together a Top Coaching Staff
When Davis was at the helm of the UM program from 1995-2000, the Hurricanes had a top notch coaching staff full of assistants that went on to climb the coaching ladder after their tenure in Coral Gables.
The ultimate goal when a head coach puts his staff together is to get a group of coaches that will have great success and move on. A head coach should want his coordinators to eventually move on and become a head coach at another program. Position coaches should be expected to have the ability to eventually become a coordinator. That type of upward mobility indicates great success that was achieved within a specific staff.
Davis’ coaching staff at Miami in 2000 featured three future NFL coaches in defensive coordinator Greg Schiano, defensive backs coach Chuck Pagano, and tight ends coach Rob Chudzinski. The wide receivers coach at that time, Curtis Johnson, has climbed the coaching ladder and is now the head coach at Tulane. Davis’ graduate assistant in 2000 was Mario Cristobal. That is a lot of smart football coaches in a room and while that type of success can’t be expected to be duplicated, Miami needs to raise the level of their coaching staff.
Top level coaching staffs goes beyond the Davis era as well. Davis comes from the Jimmy Johnson coaching tree, which produced many future head coaches as well. Davis was a defensive line coach at UM from 1984-88. Also on Johnson’s staff at Miami was Dave Wannstedt at defensive coordinator, Dave Campo as the defensive backs coach, Gary Stevens as offensive coordinator, and Tony Wise as an offensive line coach. Tommy Tuberville was a graduate assistant on that coaching staff.
Miami coach Al Golden lost the top two assistants he had at UM early in his tenure in offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch, who went on to have the same position with the Jacksonville Jaguars, and wide receivers coach George McDonald, who went on to be an offensive coordinator at Syracuse. The majority of the assistants that Golden has had on staff either followed him from Temple or were largely under-qualified with little experience to be coaching at a program at the level of Miami.
Golden’s ego got in the way of putting together a strong coaching staff. Golden put a bunch of yes men around him on the coaching staff and while that may lead to strong friendships among the coaches, it isn’t the best environment for success. A good head coach is not afraid to put a group of top football minds around him that will challenge him and aren’t afraid to bring their own ideas to the table.
The coaching staff under Al Golden was one of the worst by a team in any of the power five conferences. Miami needs to get back to having top coordinators and position coaches that can develop players and put their players in positions to have success. When Miami is successful, the Hurricanes have a head coach that wants a top notch coaching staff around him.
Bringing Back The Miami Culture
There is no other way to say it: the University of Miami football team got soft during the Al Golden era. When Miami was at its best, there was always top-level competition at practices during the season, during offseason workouts, and during tough moments in games. Miami lost that edge during the Golden era and it all starts with the culture that was established and the type of players that were brought into the program.
If players or coaches from Miami’s successful years witnessed UM practices from recent years, they would be shocked. The practices became too easy, too soft, and became more about skill development than competition. Golden’s practices were conducted like their primary objective was about not getting injured rather than promoting competition and toughness.
At their height, Miami’s program was notorious for having players that were some of the hardest workers in the country. That was the standard the coaching staff set. If a wide receiver was out grinding on his own in the offseason, the rest of the receivers better match or surpass that intensity level or they would be passed up on the depth chart. During the Al Golden era, the players rarely used the jugs machine after practice and when they did it was more of a time to joke than improve their hands.
When Miami was at its best, they have a culture that breeds a natural high level of competition. When UM was at their pinnacle, the coaching staff could drop a high level talent in that culture and watch that competition squeeze the most out of that player. That culture didn’t exist at Miami during the Al Golden era. Over the past five seasons, it has been acceptable to “do what the coaches tell us.” Players no longer do the extra work you would routinely see after practice when the Hurricanes were at their peak. Players were encouraged to work hard in the offseason, but not to do too much on their own. The program developed a culture of just doing enough to get by rather than pushing themselves to attain new heights.
The UM program has seen a lack of player development and have seen their players go on to the NFL and have better careers there than they did at Miami. Some of that can be attributed to poor coaching, but a lot of it is attributed to the weak culture that Miami has fostered in recent years. In recent years, players that come from Miami are pushed harder once they arrive in the cutthroat environment that exists at the NFL level. That type of competitive environment used to exist at UM.
Miami has become a mentally weak program under Golden and it has manifested on the field. Throughout the Al Golden era, the Hurricanes have been poor in games in which they play against competitive teams and have not finished any season on a strong note. Miami has been thrashed against talented teams like Clemson and North Carolina in 2015, Louisville and FSU in 2013, and Notre Dame and Kansas State in 2012. Miami was physically whipped and mentally fragile in all of those blowout losses. From 2011-14, the Hurricanes have a cumulative record of 7-9 in the final four games of each of those seasons and UM did not win any bowl games.
Particularly on defense, Golden neutered what makes the UM program great and South Florida recruits special—he took away the ability of the players to go make plays. Golden and his coaching staff preferred a player to do his assignment and let the play come to him. Defensive players routinely said that they “trust the coaches” to put them in positions to make plays. They waited for the plays to come to them rather than just go make the plays themselves.
The best example of this mentality happened in 2013 when Miami beat Virginia 45-26 at home. Miami’s first score of the game came on an interception returned for a touchdown by cornerback Tracy Howard on the very first play of the game. Howard returned the pick 19 yards for a touchdown that gave the Hurricanes a quick 7-0 lead and immediately established what type of game UVA was in for. When Howard returned to the sideline following that play, rather than being congratulated for making a tremendous play to open the game, he received an earful from defensive coordinator Mark D’Onofrio for free-lancing on the play. Miami’s defense used to pride itself on making plays. The Al Golden defense wanted its players to be robots in a bend but don’t break passive system.
During the 1995-2000 era, the Miami defense was the identity of the team. Under Golden, that identity became soft and passive.
Miami once had a culture that made it unique and special in the college football landscape. The next UM head coach needs to recapture that winning, competitive culture that embraces players who want to play fast and make plays. That culture has a history of breeding championships at UM.
Understanding the UM Landscape
The head coach at the University of Miami is one of the most unique jobs in college sports. The expectations are incredibly high, the game day fan support is not ideal, and the stadium is a 30-minute drive from campus just to name a few of the challenges.
With all that being said, the Miami program has a high ceiling and has the ability to compete at the highest level. If Miami has a coach that can accentuate their strengths that UM can offer the school will compete for National Championships. If UM wins at a high level, it will bring the fans back to the stadium. Will UM ever be able to consistently be able to sell out their games? No, but more fans will come out to games.
When Miami was having success in the 1980s, early 1990s, and 2000s, the Hurricanes only sold out the big games of the season. Poor fan support is part of the challenge at UM, but it hasn’t affected the Hurricanes from becoming a great team in the past. Recruits ideally want to play in front of a packed stadium every game, but ultimately their number one goal is to make it to the NFL. If recruits are confident that Miami’s next coach can help them achieve that goal, they will come to UM because of the strengths the school can offer.
So what does Miami offer? First of all it is in the middle of the most talented recruiting area in the country. The built in advantage that Miami has on the recruiting trail can’t be undersold. Miami, of course, is not going to land all of the top players in South Florida, but if they land their fair share they can easily average ten win seasons in the ACC.
Another big advantage Miami can offer? The school is in the city Miami—a tremendous destination city. If Miami can land a coach that gives recruits confidence that they can be developed and can get to NFL, the Hurricanes will land the top players and have success on the field. Players want to play and live in South Florida. Miami needs to hire the right coach to give recruits confidence that they can reach their potential at UM. Most Miami kids want to stay close to home.
Miami also offers a tremendous brand and history of success. When Miami is at its best, it is one of the coolest programs in the country and cool matters when it comes to recruiting the top players. Even now while Miami is mired in a decade of mediocrity, the UM brand carries some weight.
The Miami job is not easy. It is a job that has plenty of negatives, but the strengths of the program far outweigh those negatives. Miami’s next coach must understand the challenge that the UM job presents and must work towards magnifying the strengths so that the weaknesses are minimized. If Miami finds a coach that can win, it is one of the top college football jobs in the country and compete for national championships. There aren’t many jobs around the country that can offer that type of ceiling. Miami can return to being a top level team again, the school just needs to find the right coach to get them there.
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