12-07-2022, 07:45 AM
If we're going off the board/radar here - and I'm sure there's no chance of it happening - here’s an option: Michael Locksley. He’s undergone quite a metamorphosis from his fledgling days as a HC. Was an assistant/RC for Friedgen’s very good-to-great Maryland teams in the early aughts (where he worked alongside Coach Brattan, incidentally). Later got his first HC opportunity at New Mexico and, succinctly, bombed, with some unfortunate displays of immaturity in the process.
Eventually joined Saban at Bama for a very productive OC stint - indeed, won the 2018 Broyles Award - then returned to College Park in ‘19. Inherited a disaster due to the Durkin fallout, but now has the program in a position to, if not yet contend for the B1G title, be ultra-competitive and maybe pick off a couple B1G dogs a year. Almost did just that vs. two of the four current playoff teams, actually.
He’s also working under tougher-than-many admissions constraints – UMd.’s really become a national, nigh-elite academic power over the years, public or private. (IINM, he was at Army early in his career, so there’s experience at yet another top-tier academic school.) And by all accounts, he’s grown into a man of unimpeachable integrity who genuinely cares about the sport and about his student-athletes. Never hear about his student-athletes being mixed up in unseemliness. He somewhat presents as a more charismatic, engaging, dynamic Shaw.
Re recruiting, he targets high-character, hard-charging young men who will graduate, be it high school or the portal. At UMd. as an assistant, he was key in bringing in future NFL stars Vernon Davis, Shaune Merriman, and Stefon Diggs, to name three. The late Dwayne Haskins was going to commit, but when Locksley wasn't promoted as the permanent HC in '15, he opted for Ohio St. As HC, he got the younger Tagovailoa to transfer there from Bama, and he may be a ’23 dark horse Voldemort candidate. Successfully recruited Mike Tomlin’s son – just a guess, but I get the impression that Tomlin wouldn’t entrust his offspring to any ol’ coach. And before that, he had Jalen Hurts in the fold as a grad transfer, ‘til Hurts had a last-second change of heart. FTR, the ’22 class was ranked 38th nationally; the year before, 24th.
There are a lot of smart kids in the colloquial DMV who play football. Locksley can get them, or many anyway, to go wherever he is; the track record says as much.
One more consideration – monetarily, he’s probably not going to ask for the farm, so to say. He’s among the lowest-paid - maybe the lowest-paid - HC(s) in the B1G, so it may not take a colossal raise to get him to an institution like Stanford. FWIW, as he also spent some time at Pacific, he's not a total stranger to Northern California.
All that said, not sure he’d leave, especially to go cross-country. While he’s not a UMd. alum, he’s as close to it without actually being one. He seems to truly love that school and the surrounding D.C. community, and it wouldn't be surprising if, true to his upstanding character, he wants to see the program’s rebuild all the way through.
Still, this’s a tire that I wish would've been kicked. I’m a fan (hard to tell, I know /s) and believe he’d be an asset both to Stanford and to its football program.
Eventually joined Saban at Bama for a very productive OC stint - indeed, won the 2018 Broyles Award - then returned to College Park in ‘19. Inherited a disaster due to the Durkin fallout, but now has the program in a position to, if not yet contend for the B1G title, be ultra-competitive and maybe pick off a couple B1G dogs a year. Almost did just that vs. two of the four current playoff teams, actually.
He’s also working under tougher-than-many admissions constraints – UMd.’s really become a national, nigh-elite academic power over the years, public or private. (IINM, he was at Army early in his career, so there’s experience at yet another top-tier academic school.) And by all accounts, he’s grown into a man of unimpeachable integrity who genuinely cares about the sport and about his student-athletes. Never hear about his student-athletes being mixed up in unseemliness. He somewhat presents as a more charismatic, engaging, dynamic Shaw.
Re recruiting, he targets high-character, hard-charging young men who will graduate, be it high school or the portal. At UMd. as an assistant, he was key in bringing in future NFL stars Vernon Davis, Shaune Merriman, and Stefon Diggs, to name three. The late Dwayne Haskins was going to commit, but when Locksley wasn't promoted as the permanent HC in '15, he opted for Ohio St. As HC, he got the younger Tagovailoa to transfer there from Bama, and he may be a ’23 dark horse Voldemort candidate. Successfully recruited Mike Tomlin’s son – just a guess, but I get the impression that Tomlin wouldn’t entrust his offspring to any ol’ coach. And before that, he had Jalen Hurts in the fold as a grad transfer, ‘til Hurts had a last-second change of heart. FTR, the ’22 class was ranked 38th nationally; the year before, 24th.
There are a lot of smart kids in the colloquial DMV who play football. Locksley can get them, or many anyway, to go wherever he is; the track record says as much.
One more consideration – monetarily, he’s probably not going to ask for the farm, so to say. He’s among the lowest-paid - maybe the lowest-paid - HC(s) in the B1G, so it may not take a colossal raise to get him to an institution like Stanford. FWIW, as he also spent some time at Pacific, he's not a total stranger to Northern California.
All that said, not sure he’d leave, especially to go cross-country. While he’s not a UMd. alum, he’s as close to it without actually being one. He seems to truly love that school and the surrounding D.C. community, and it wouldn't be surprising if, true to his upstanding character, he wants to see the program’s rebuild all the way through.
Still, this’s a tire that I wish would've been kicked. I’m a fan (hard to tell, I know /s) and believe he’d be an asset both to Stanford and to its football program.