As for other candidates:

Muschamp is going back to Auburn by all accounts.
My understanding is, Alliotti got bought out by Oregon and can't coach w/o effecting his severance.

I know Orgeron wants to be a HC, but reviving the Cougar defense might propel him into another role.

break the dline up like Price and Doba did. The guy knew/knows everyone. Get him down to LA with Mike Leach to be the closer instead of Doba and you will see some very good kids make their way to Pullman.

Personally, I don't think that Leach has a preference for either a 3 or 4 man front…I suspect that he just wants a DC who knows how to run which ever defense is on the field at that moment. And who is capable of teaching the kids how to do the same. But this board in particular has had a number of "discussions" about the relative merits of each, so with the Leach/Moos DC short list now into its fermenting stage (or perhaps a bit past fermentation; perhaps closer to the clarifying point), this seems like the right conversation for us.

Ground Rules: this is not another Wulff/Doba/etc. debate. Nor is it a "Leach threw them under the bus" debate. Other than that, have at it.

I'll start by giving a nod to the Biggs position on the issue, which I interpret as: "I don't care which you pick, but pick one and stick with it". Personally, I am not sold that you have to stick with one or the other, if by chance you have the personnel to run either. Of course, over time you would expect a DC to recruit to his preferred system, but that doesn't mean that you won't end up with a DE kid or two in a primarily 3-4 group, or a Buck or two in a primarily 4-3.

Various people have commented on what is easiest to recruit. I am prepared to lean toward being able to identify and find more DE's. That probably means that they are easier to recruit, but on the other hand, that is also a position for which you will be facing more competition on the recruiting trail, because more teams run a 4-3. Part of my reasoning is also because I understand the DE position and don't consider it difficult to identify potential candidates. On the other hand, I can't claim to be able to define, let alone identify, Buck candidates. I'll bet we could have a productive thread centered around what a Buck is supposed to do and how you would identify that kid at the HS level. Maybe that is the direction that this thread will head.

Regardless of who Leach hires, that guy will also have a group of existing kids that he'll need to use for several years. I think we have enough wide bodies on the D side to run either system. What we don't have is a whole bunch of DE's or even a whole bunch of Bucks…at least if you define either as being able to both rush the passer and contain the sweep. I also tend to think that we are little short of good LB's, which either system will need. I'm frankly not sure which system has the greater need for LB's…though if you had at least two good DE's, it certainly takes a lot of pressure off the LB group as a whole.

Thoughts?

Asking for a friend.

Coach made some adjustments in his starting lineup. The result was a win over Rice. i would expect another victory today to even things up at 3-3 . we will see what happens . A veteran coach knows how to maximize the talent he has at his disposal. I will expect the team ,despite it s limited talent,to improve as the season goes on.Kent will do what is needed to make this team better. Kent will bring the program up and his team will be much better next year. Kent knew that he neede bigs and point guards . Given the little time he had to work with,he got some frosh point guards who will only get better. i believe that his next recruitibg class is btter than people are giving him credit for. The naysayers will jump on the bandwagon next year,just mark my words

Warren Moon has repeatedly referred to the Chickenhawks as "we". Is that okay because he played for them? He isn't playing for them anymore. I think he is just trying to ride the coattails of a Superbowl team. Thoughts?

enjoy

it's an opinion

The lack of preparedness by the entire football operation was
abhorrent. The team goes without further explanation, but the stadium
and access to and from was very neglected.

My mom is near 60 and
my dad 70, and those kind of conditions will prevent both of them from
attending a game during anything more than a stiff breeze in the
future.

My mom was lucky to escape with a few bruises and not a broken wrist after slipping and falling exiting the fieldhouse.

Further,
my dad is a Vietnam vet with neuropathy in his legs from Agent orange
exposure; he can't walk all that well without pain, and the cold seems
to exacerbate it. But do you think we could get some kind of assistance
to either get him to our car or get the car to him? Nope. Granted, I
hadn't prepared by figuring this out beforehand, but the rent a cops and
other staff there were of absolutely zero help. They told us he had to
walk from Stadium way around to the north side of the fieldhouse, and
basically tough sh!t. I had to plea with one of the parking kids to
give my parents a lift in his car - whoever you are, thank you for
having a a heart and common sense.

Anyway, icemelt is dirt cheap
and they should have ordered it 2 months ago, so there is no excuse for
the conditions around the stadium. I mean, they had all day... smh.

Difference maker?

I don't watch much pro football, but as I surfed the interwebs and had the games on in the background, I heard Buchannon and Abdullah's names a lot. Don't know what that means, just sayin'.

while the heads of his assistants roll.

Sorry, but for a guy who is a supposed offensive genius, color me not impressed.

4 weeks ago Coug Nation was convinced that, considering his past track record of plug and play underclassmen, Leach would be able to have Falk ready and be a servicable qb by at least Apple Cup.

This is a guy who is supposed to be able to do more with less, remember? Well, from everything I've seen he's done less with less. The run game is nonexistent, the offense looks like the one Rosie and Wulff ran, and the D and special teams just plain stink.

While I do acknowledge the inherent limitation of our program, both current and past, the complete lack of accountability from the top man is wearing thin with me. The mentality of "the players are 100% responsible for the outcome of the game, either because they did or didn't execute" is garbage. Peterson had his very average team ready to come out and kick our a$$es up and down the field yesterday; Leach's team came out and did the exact same thing they've done all season - same plays, same mistakes, same lack of fire.

I will always support my team, my Cougs. However, CML was brought in here to win. I don't think its unfair to say that at most colleges he would be on the hotseat for next year, and this years seat would have already been VERY hot.

This year's result is 100% unacceptable. Why is it unacceptable? I'll give you 2.5 million reasons why. And now this... this bloodletting to appease the masses. The biggest impact that this is going to have is setting our D back another 2 years. Breske has his players, and they aren't going to adjust to the new coach; it happens all the time. So we'll lose them to attitude, or transfer, or dismissal, thinning out the depth chart even further.

Do I think Breske needed to go? I don't know. The D showed flashes at times, but I don't know what that meant. Were they coached well one week, but not the next? Was Breske given orders to run his D a certain way by Leach? Had he lost his players? Who knows? What I do know is that this coaching carousel and lack of cohesiveness is never good for a team.

This post was edited on 11/30 9:43 PM by BleedCrimsonandGray

kid is having a tough night

Gardena (Calif.) Serra's Scrappy Norman took an official visit to Washington State in October and has since maintained a strong connection with the Cougar coaching staff, reports Rivals analyst Adam Gorney.

The four-star athlete, rated No. 4 in the country, has also officially visited Arizona State and the Sun Devils remain a strong player for Norman, who's also looking at a few other official visits but after canceling a trip to Louisville this weekend, he has no firm visit plans.

Gorney, however, was able to talk to Norman a little bit about his interest in Washington State since his visit, which he called "a great experience."

"Pretty much it's like I could come in and play right away as a young kid, as a freshman," Norman said. "I enjoyed Wazzu. It was a great experience and it was good to see something I've never seen before.

"The weather was different but I know if I'm on the field it won't be any bother. It was pretty good. I enjoyed being there and it was pretty fun."

You can view the rest of the article here: https://washingtonstate.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1710565

I asked the Wazzu pledge if his commitment has changed at all with the report that some defensive assistant coaches had been let go. He's made it clear he's sticking with the Cougars:

"My commitment is still good," Molton said. "This doesn't change my mind at all. If the Wazzu staff felt this is best for the program I trust it and I'm still sticking with Washington State."

According to Jacob Thorpe of the Spokesman Review, Washington State defensive line coach Joe Salave'a has also been named the Associate Head Coach. Another outlet reported this evening that Salave'a would take over special teams duties, however Thorpe's report says that is not true.

Just depressing, want hope, don't have it. Moos will ride Leach out.

Tweet, tweet.

Need speed on both sides of the ball.Need runner like Sankey to make 1-3 yards when reeded.Need 4 defense lineman who can pressure QB and have 8 on defense to guard agiainst the
pass and keep runners in check behind the line. Surprised they did not kick 3 field goals to be ahead 9-7!
May need new coach if we cannot recruit. Not many want to come to losing bottom teams.
Dick Kim 5l Hawaii Coug

Daquawn Brown needs to get benched. We were far better without him last week and he has sucked in consecutive plays to start tonight. Gives up 8 yards on a pass and primps and preens like a freakin' rooster and then knocks a teammate off course and gives up a huge TD because he's got dick for field awareness.

This post was edited on 11/29 7:48 PM by Flatlandcoug

Galderia goes for 33 and they beat Maryland 70 - 64 to improve to 5-2. They have a good shot to enter Pac 12 @ 9-2 with good Tournament resume.

Like I said from the jump.. Leach is crap of a coach... and he is probing it in spades

This post was edited on 11/29 10:56 PM by M-I-Coug

I can only recall 1, v ASU where this team came out ready to play at the start of the game.

That's all I have to say.

He even educated the venerable Bob-Rob on the whole 30-second TOs thing. Great stuff, and he really makes the radio broadcast come alive. Such a big, big upgrade from walden. I would like to get Gesser some speech therapy classes during the off-season, but his insights are really, really nice.

The game supposedly started 10 minutes ago but it's not in any of the normal streams those of us out-of-area Cougs have to resort to. Any luck? I know it's on FS1 but it's not showing up anywhere yet.