He was a pretty good coach by IU standards, and a pretty good Big 10 coach should be well above average in the AAC. The reality is we aren't going to get the hottest guys, anyone we hire is going to have some warts and baggage. I don't personally like hiring retreads but people can learn and there are coaches who had a bad first job and ended up being very successful coaches. We're hiring out of the Day Old bin so nothing in that bin is going to be top quality.
Marrion and Kinne
- Thread starter bluegold70
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Adding to that, the time tables also vary widely based on the circumstances from job to job. TU isn’t an easy job in the first place, but add to that the embarrassing aspects of academics and on field bulls!t that Monty left we weren’t going to see an overnight successful turnaround on all the metrics. I’m just glad that we’ve been able to see marked progress in a number of areas that relate to culture so we have the opportunity to bring in the Jimmies and Joes we need to put the program on a long term trajectory for success.
Tom Allen did well with KW's team and culture and then the wheels fell off. Who knows how much of Allen's "success" was due to what KW built? I don't, but I know that's the kind of argument where people feel strongly one way or the other, entirely based on which side supports their current point. Putting aside KW's first housecleaning year, he and Allen had basically exactly the same winning %, just under 41%. Allen rocked it for his first 4 years after KW and then went 9-27 his next 3.
And with experience comes a better list of contacts that can be brought on board so the HC can confidently develop a plan for improvement and let those guys loose to implement said plans with the confidence they’re being carried out.
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Can't and won't are two very different things. I feel like some people on here have never actually interacted with another human being before. Some people are conflict averse, some aren't. Some don't mind being strict disciplinarians, some hate doing that. Monty could have done these things but he didn't. Is this Kinne's strong point? I have no idea, but lots of people are just not able to do that. Is this really a novel concept to people? it's not "are you this kind of coach or that kind of coach", it's "what kind of a person are you? What are you comfortable doing? What are you not comfortable with?" Why do you think that half of new managers fail? Management isn't that hard in theory but it's darn hard to do. Same with coaching.
I wouldn’t say that is entirely accurate. Allen went 10-15 the three years immediately after KW with the first year being a very short covid year. In years 4 and 5 post KW Allen went 14-7. The wheels fell off after year 5. I don’t give coaches much credit for the win-loss records 4 years after they depart.
The portal changed things too. Allen recruited and had the luxury of Michael Penix, Jr. as the QB there for a couple of years and Indiana started scaring Big 10 foes to where the opposing coaches has to actually game plan a defense for Indiana in order to stop Penix or it was possible Indiana would outscore them. Penix took over the QB position in 2019. Indiana went to a bowl game (8-5 overall), 2020 they went 6-2 (6-1 in the B1G) in the shortened COVID year, 2021 Indiana went 2-10. Penix only played 5 games before being injured. They tanked after that. Penix then transferred to Washington and is a Heisman candidate. That'll hurt a coach.
If you look at Indiana's history in football, the last time any coach was marginally successful was in the mid 80s to late 90s under Bill Mallory who had several 7-4 seasons but enough dog seasons over the 13 years he doesn't have winning record. Indiana knows it's a basketball school and they haven't tried hard to be a football school.
And let's remember Wilson wasn't fired at Indiana for not succeeding in terms of W-L...he was fired for being too old school and a hard ass on players. The same reason Leach was fired at Texas Tech, the same reason Mangino got fired at Kansas (look at how that karma came back to bite them in the a$$). Look at the connection there. All Bob Stoops' guys. Anyone want to guess how many guys at OU had their chops busted by old school coaching...yet no one complained about it. Wonder why? I know things have changed and some coaches were able to immediately adjust and some didn't and paid for it. Wilson went to back to back bowls his last 2 seasons there which hadn't happened in almost 30 years at Indiana so let's not say he wasn't successful there. It's one of the hardest coaching jobs in the country b/c of the basketball worship in Bloomington...and not just at IU. There's basically a shrine to John Wooden at a local HS nearby where he played which draws almost as many visitors annually as Indiana football games. Despite the ridiculous resources IU has, the stigma of being a "basketball school" will always be there and you can bet other B1G schools are using that as a negative in recruiting battles. Wilson did a pretty damn good job there actually. And after the first season, he did show improvement every year and that's just glossing at the records. He gets 2 more years to keep showing the improvement.
The two hottest up and coming coaches in the sport are both TU alums and we’re arguing about the keys to being a successful middle manager and why a .353 career winning percentage is good, actually.
This thread makes me want to take an ink pen and jam it in my eye socket.
As I said when he was announced Wilson was not my first choice but I will support him until he has had a reasonable time to prove himself or not. Some of you here will never give the guy a chance but are likely the same people who if we hired Kinne or Marion would say “we always hire TU grads …..”.
Wilson had the program in a solid state when he departed, with 2 consecutive bowl games after taking over a not so hot situation. So Wilson's record the first year or two at Indiana may be tough to judge.
I do believe that he has enough here now, and with what he is bringing in, that he should be able to succeed in 2024. We will see.
Success hinges on finding a QB imo. Hopefully, Francis is that guy. Early indications are positive.
DING, DING, DING!!! We have a winner!
I'm always reminded of one quote from the great philosopher Yoda; "Do or Do Not, There is NO Try."
Luke Skywalker was probably in his 20's and Yoda was 900 years old.....
Sorry for the digression. I've successfully managed people for most of my adult life and can tell you it was a helluva lot harder to get full buy in when I was in my 20's and 30's than it has been in my 40's and 50's and when the tough calls had to be made they were much better received.
This. Need three QBs who can play and some roster management on the line.
Speaking of roster management, KW was hired for a variety of reasons, proven recruiting success in Oklahoma and Texas being one of them. Something Coach Kinne didn’t have.
Kinne took the job at Texas State, gave a Todd Graham scripted press conference about restoring faith in the program amongst high school coaches, touted he and his Dad’s ties to high school coaching in Texas, then promptly ignored high school recruiting and portalled 40 or so players in/out and hopefully on to other schools.
TU had no interest in disrupting the education of the kids on the existing roster. The school does have a responsibility to educate kids and keep its promises to them, despite what Deon says and does.
TU doesn’t need another weak recruiting class because children couldn’t recruit for the last ten years or end up leaving for another job a month before signing their first class. We’ve got pressing roster problems. Real issues. This is a rebuild. Hiring a kid who might leave is a luxury we couldn’t afford.
We need real live experienced adults who know what they are doing and can do it on our budget. Not some twenty somethings guessing at it then blaming the school and its facilities when kids go elsewhere. Or worse, spending millions on NIL to fit their system then bailing.
So it’s water under the bridge. If he wasn’t an alum, he would have been just another up and coming coach that didn’t quite fit with what we needed.
We didn’t need another unproven assistant. We just did that for a decade.
Hiring an older guy to stabilize the roster and identify talent that belongs at TU was the smart play.
It might not work out in the short term. The wins might not add up. He might be a bridge coach, but we are going to find out in about a month during the early signing period whether this thing can be turned around by him on a 3-5 year time line. Then we go into the portal and plug the holes. Again.
They have been offering QBs, including a heckuva prospect over in the 2025 Offers thread.
I think we fumbled the hire but the incoming class looks like it’s the best by the numbers that we’ve had in some time. Despite all of Monty’s NFL players he developed that made his classes look better over time.
Portal/JC recruiting will be very important as will player development.
My expectation is a bowl game next year at 6-6.
The GJ/Marion convo takes us nowhere. They’re having some nice success and should continue to do so.
The QB convo is funny fan stuff and a wait and see deal. As someone said, once there was film, a couple guys weren’t as good.
We have two that are serviceable IMO but need to grab a couple more older guys to have good depth and legit competition.
Portal/JC recruiting will be very important as will player development.
My expectation is a bowl game next year at 6-6.
The GJ/Marion convo takes us nowhere. They’re having some nice success and should continue to do so.
The QB convo is funny fan stuff and a wait and see deal. As someone said, once there was film, a couple guys weren’t as good.
We have two that are serviceable IMO but need to grab a couple more older guys to have good depth and legit competition.
To me, this stinks of trying to justify a bad decision. Wouldn't be surprised if you were on the committee that hired KW.
It's the same schlock that got tossed out every season when we retained Haith over and over.
If they were the two hottest up and coming coaches last year when we hired KW, then they must have the world's $hittiest agents since one could only get hired as a coordinator at a G5 program and the other could only get hired at a low level Sun Belt program, one of the least impressive jobs in a busy market last year. I'm thrilled that GJ is doing well but I'm not sure last year that he was a particularly hot commodity, based on the market that developed for him.
It was a funny post nonetheless, though.
😝 Everybody on that roster was given a chance to prove they belonged at TU.Guess that philosophy doesn’t apply to basketball
Yes, basketball players were given a year. But when it was apparent it wasn't working, time to move on. Football won't have the complete turnover, but there will be a lot in the portal. Probably not Kinne and Deion levels, but there will be turnover. Most of it dead weight. Will lose a few that could have stayed. The roster will look much better in the fall.
Actually it did apply to basketball. That’s one of the reasons we went 5-25 last season.Guess that philosophy doesn’t apply to basketball
Allen went 18-19 in his first three years immediately after KW and 9-27 in his last 3 years. Putting aside the funky COVID year, the three immediately following KW years were Allen's best 3 years. Allen's first 3 years, 18 - 19. Then COVID 6-2. Then his last 3 years, 9-27.
Years 4 and 5 were 6-2 (COVID) and 2-10. The 14-7 stretch were years 3 and 4, when KW's last class were juniors and seniors.
You might want to check the numbers. How many players have left TU from the 2021-2022 and 2022-2023 rosters?
Well, the precipitous drop might be attributed more to the transfer of Michael Penix Jr who lit it up while at Indiana and then got a bag full of $$$ dropped on him by Washington
Pennix was their main started in 2020, the COVID year when they went 6-2, and in 2021 when they went 2-10. He was pretty ordinary in 2021 and only threw less than half their passes (with a 54% completion rate). Maybe he was injured? Or realized that the talent he was going to have around him would suck? He threw about 1/3 the passes in 2019 and had stats that were pretty much interchangeable with the main started.
He wasn't the QB in Allen's first 3 years which was his best 3 full seasons.
I have a hard time attributing a teams success to a coach who has been gone from the program for 4 years. Especially a coach who was never above .500 at said school. Allen’s real success at IU started in his 4th year at the school. Lasted a few years before the bottom dropped out. To my recollection, we’ve never given any credit to a past TU coach for a teams success 3 to 4 years after he left. I do believe KW left a good roster at IU when he left. No clue how many stayed or who was there 3 years after his departure. I also believe he is recruiting at a high level here and there is a talent upgrade coming.
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This just isn't true, you're off on his years. His first 3 years were 5-7, 5-7, 8-5, which were the three best full years of his tenure. Then year 4, COVID 6-2. Everything after that was a train wreck. Year five, 2-10, 4-8, 3-9.
His best full year was year 3 when KW's class was juniors, and best overall year was COVID year 4, when KW's class was seniors, then year 1 and year 2. By year 5 when he was on his own, the wheels had come fully off, 2-10, and never got put back on. He never achieved the same success he had in each of the first 3 post-KW years.
Didn’t Allen go 0-1 in his first year which was cut short by Covid ? The 8-5 year was his 4th year at IU if my numbers are correct ?
He coached and lost the bowl game in KW's final season, 2016. So he was technically 0-1 that season. I counted that as a KW year, not an Allen year (KW was fired in December 2016, so he coached the whole regular season). The 8-5 year was the 3rd season where Allen coached from the start of the season. COVID was 2020, his 4th season of coaching the entire season. They went 6-2 that year.
Then his fully independent period, 2-10 followed by 4-8 and 3-9. None of his fully independent years were as good as years 1 and 2, right after KW left.
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Gotcha. Allen was 8-5 in 2019 and 6-3 in 2020. Allen signed 72 players from 2017 to 2019 and 92 players from 2017-2020. Those numbers don’t include transfers. The point is there were likely very few of KW players left even in the 2019 season. Again…I’ve never heard anyone on this board giving credit to an ex TU coach for a teams success 3 years after he departed. Especially with the signing of so many new players.
I think it depends on whether giving the coach credit for those years supports their argument or hurts it ... The reality I'm sure is somewhere in the middle, but that's not fun for a message board. As I vaguely recall, most of the skill players on O were JRs or SRs at least in 2019 but I don't know if they were transfers.
Whatever, I think one thing we can all agree on is that when Allen was fully on his own, with guys he recruited and developed, the bottom fell out, never to approach his seasons with KW guys. I'm sure that's purely coincidental though.
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Since we are talking about Indiana, I knew they've historically been a bad football program... but wow it is really really bad. Allen had two +.500 seasons in conference (2019 and 2020). Before that, Indiana wasn't above .500 in conference since 1993!
