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Mark Richt To Miami: Is He Ready To Win Big?
Mark Richt as Miami's new head coach. Is he ready to start winning the big games?
December 2, 2015
Mark Richt was let go by Georgia on Monday, and he’s the Miami head coach on Wednesday. Is he the right fit for the legendary program?
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Mark Richt couldn’t win the big game, and now …
And now it’s a chance for Richt to do something special. It’s a bit of a debate about whether or not Miami really is a good job considering the unrealistic and outside expectations compared to the opportunity, but it’s not hard to recruit there – and Richt is a terrific recruiting force – and being in the ACC makes things far, far easier than being in the SEC, even in the East.
However, considering the knock on Richt was that he’s a ten-win guy and not the type of coach who gets to brush off confetti at the end of a season, this is a wee bit of a risk, even with his big name.
He’s the A-list name the program needed if it wasn’t going to be another Miami family man like Mario Cristobal, and he certainly knows the program as a former Hurricane backup quarterback. But now he has to beat Florida State. He has to win ACC championships. He has to be Mega-Game Mark. He has to be a College Football Playoff head coach.
Miami is about as unforgiving as it comes to head coaches who don’t win national titles, but Richt might just be that good. He’ll get one year, and then he’ll have to be just that great.
Is Mark Richt too nice?
How to put this the right way … just watch the 30 for 30 documentaries on Miami.
Is it possible for Miami to be Miami without Uncle Luke, Nevin Shapirol, and all the periphery things that made it the biggest badass sports program on the planet for such a long period of time?
Al Golden did a fantastic job of trying to keep the ship afloat after all the rumors, speculation and concerns with the NCAA’s Sword of Damocles hanging over the program’s head, but once that all went away the wins didn’t follow. On the plus side, there weren’t any mega-issues under his watch.
Richt is the ultimate good dude head coach – he’s the guy you want to see win. But is it possible to do it at Miami in a Nice Guys Finish First sort of way?
Again, all that matters at Miami is how much Richt wins. As long as Miami is playing for ACC championships every year, good guy, jerkweed, it doesn’t matter.
What is Richt walking into?
Yeah, about that whole year of grace period idea I alluded to earlier, he’ll get that, but there’s no real excuse not to take the mediocre ACC Coastal right away.
It sort of got blown off, but Miami turned into the fourth-best team in the ACC behind Clemson, North Carolina and Florida State. Totally ignored in the Al Golden firing was that after the strange Thursday night loss to Cincinnati, the Hurricane went 5-3 the rest of the way with the only losses coming to the league’s big three. Granted, the defense didn’t show up against Clemson and Florida State, but the team fought through the adversity to beat Duke on the road – sort of – and get by Pitt and Virginia Tech. No, it’s not the season Hurricane fans wanted, but 8-4 isn’t horrendous.
Richt isn’t starting from Ground Zero.
The 2016 schedule is being put together, but there are road games at Appalachian State – don’t laugh; the Canes will have to try – and Notre Dame. What Richt has to work with, though, should make any schedule manageable.
Starting with Brad Kaaya at quarterback, depending on a couple of parts hanging around like WR Stacy Coley, there should be around eight to nine returning starters including the entire offensive line.
This might not have been a star-studded team, but it was full of young options and it comes back deep. There should be a good rotation at running back, the defensive front seven was almost all underclassmen at times, and kicker Michael Badgley was among the best in the ACC.
