Northwestern parts ways with Kurt Anderson
- Thread starter mshelton33
- Start date
IMO he was a good coach and recruiter. I would have kept him.
But that having been said the new OC deserves the right to have his guys in his slots, I respect that.
But that having been said the new OC deserves the right to have his guys in his slots, I respect that.
Problem with KA is that the O-line rarely played together as a cohesive unit.
Keeping it positive: our best 3 OL of the past few years (Slater, Skoronski, and Priebe) all seemed really tight with Anderson.
He’ll definitely get more opportunities at the college or pro level. I wonder if he’s better suited for the NFL.
I also wonder if the main problems were health & Bajakian’s system. We lost a potential stud in Stovall to medical retirement and we struggled with depth.
Priebe is a developmental win.
The other two were NFL players from the moment they stepped on campus.
I’d argue that the strength program was a bigger hindrance than health or the scheme. Hopefully that’s getting fixed up too.
Speaking of S&C, any changes there?
Quick, before Coral lies about the rock again.
Quick, before Coral lies about the rock again.
A classy and … unique farewell post from Anderson. I bet he’s a fun coach to play for.
Reading the glowing tweets from former players and parents it seems that this is another mistake by Braun. Anderson’s replacement better be an improvement and can’t believe we hired someone from Coach Prime’s Colorado.
"Another mistake". I'll give him the benefit of the doubt, especially if, as alleged, his unit was the core of the hazing problem.
Braun had to clean house. I'm a little surprised he kept/promoted Tim Mc
Except they were a bad unit when he was here.
Death, taxes and poor play from Northwestern's offensive line seemed like the only certainties in life the past decade or more. Why on earth would anyone be surprised that a new coach and OC wouldn't fire the coach in charge of that underperforming unit? I can't believe this is even a debate!!
McGarigle always seemed like our high potential young coach other than Ayeni the past couple of years.
I think it makes perfect sense for him to stay on and be promoted as DC as the program guy/Northwestern Man maintaining continuity, especially under a defense oriented HC like Braun will be. Best situation for McGarigle, he can be a HC someday not too far off if he can keep the defense on track from this year's improvements.
If Braun leaves, also gives us a great option to promote from within to HC.
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I like the tweet.
"Life kicks us in the teeth, and some turn and run, some sour and become cynical"
is this just a generalization or is he talking about players or coaches?
The offensive line wasn't too bad this year, for some its just a mantra.
OL is probably the harshest (often unfairly) judged part of the team because sacks and deficiencies in run/pass protection are the most seen parts of the game and easy to point to when a team isn't scoring or loses. It's just harder to watch the rest of the offense downfield because everyone's eyes are on the ball (and TV doesn't show downfield until the ball is there).
We'll see how O'Boyle does, he didn't have a good year at Colorado but that's tough to judge because that program was a circus.
Hopefully Lujan and co. can put together a workable offense.
I don't think our fans have unreasonable expectations as far as offense goes, we're just looking for better internal QB development and enough production to win games if our defense can keep games low scoring.
We're going to win games the same way we have for 17 years: slow the game down, keep the number of overall possessions low, get a lead at some point and squeeze the air out of the ball; power team built out of what we have on the roster.
If Braun/McGarigle defenses can reach Hank's typical level, we can be a regular bowl team and threat for 8+ wins.
Hope not. Hope Lujan can field a top 5 offense like he did at SDSU. And we can win a lot moar than 8.
if the QB can't see the field, the O-line looks bad.
When Bryant was behind center, the O-line seemed to play a lot better.
With our schedule I can’t see 8 wins. But then again looked what happened this year.
NU minus Bajakian plus Lujan is worth at least 4 wins. If we don’t win 12 next year, something is wrong.
I mean other than Ohio State/Michigan, I don't think anybody else looks like a 5-10% win probability game on our schedule next year.
@Washington will be tough, and we've had a *really* rough go of Duke the past 5 games against them, but it's not an impossible schedule by any stretch.
New Big Ten will have its share of tough games and its share of winnable games.
There'll be plenty of games against teams that we're 0.500 or better against in recent history.
We should be able to find at least 5-6 wins on that schedule if Lujan can put together a workable offense and McGarigle runs the defense at the level Braun did this year.
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We usually play up or down to our competition. So who knows what comes next season?? But if we win 10 games we deserve to be in playoff for sure
That was under Fitz. I don’t think we lost to anyone we weren’t supposed to this year.
Did you attend the Howard game? I did. We won but with another minute we might not have. We kicked some tush vs teams like wis Utah etc. I attended all 3 games and it was like a complete different team
Bryant was hurt because our OL completely blew a play.
I think it's impossible to predict how next season will go until we see how the QB position is going to shake out. Like GCG said somewhere in these threads, I hope next year's starter isn't on the roster yet. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, but I don't think any of the current QBs are leading this team to many wins. We would need to see massive improvement.
Wasn't only a Bryant/Sully thing. We gave up 50 plus sacks and had a ton of running plays that were no gain/TFL. Bryant got clocked by PSU.
Yeah that ultimately is the rub; who knows what team we have next year, what the QB situation is like, what the offense or even defense under McGarigle calling looks like. How we start or finish the season, whether we play up/down to competition, etc.
I feel like nothing would surprise me next year from 2-3 wins to 8-10 wins.
This year I was legitimately shocked by the win total getting over 4, while 8 was unimaginable coming off of a 1 win season and the offseason fiasco.
After 2023, expectations are a fair bit different; not 8 wins or bust but rather, "yeah I can see the whole range of possibilities" here.
I'm optimistic though, hopefully we get the QB/offense worked out quickly this season and the defense works under McGarigle.
Would be great to get to bowls these next 2 years before new RF is built, but it's more about the process of Braun's staff coming together.
