COUGS @ HUSKIES

[HawkWow]

BOW DOWN COUGS!

 

[davidonmi]

I said before the season a step forward was winning big games on the road. The only conference road win was a team that had clearly quit. A very hollow 8-4. If we lose the bowl game and go 8-5 in year 5 it is not a step forward. If we win it is a small step forward. This was basically the same outcome as last year except we played 3 bad teams instead of 2 ooc (we played lsu last year)

 

[Throwdown]

Nahhhh where's my homie Dohboy at? I know he isn't gonna avoid this thread like Ryan Leaf does rehab.

 

[kearly]

I said before the season a step forward was winning big games on the road. The only conference road win was a team that had clearly quit. A very hollow 8-4. If we lose the bowl game and go 8-5 in year 5 it is not a step forward. If we win it is a small step forward. This was basically the same outcome as last year except we played 3 bad teams instead of 2 ooc (we played lsu last year)

Downplaying doesn't get much more exquisite than this. Someone's pushing an agenda methinks.

IF I agreed with you, which I don't but if I did, I would focus my argument on how weak next season's Husky team will probably be. The 2013 Huskies are 8-4, will probably be 9-4 after drawing an unranked team in their toilet bowl game, and statistically they have played like a 10 win team. They were a great team this year, to complain about the best season in a decade plus is just flat out unappreciative.

Also, no disrespect but bitching about road savvy is weaksauce. Winning on the road is tough as hell, especially against good teams. UW's record against unranked teams on the road is fantastic, it's their record against ranked teams on the road that sucks. But guess what? Beating ranked teams on the road is really hard to do. If they are ranked, then odds are they are extremely tough to beat in their house.

Unrelated, but I laugh sometimes at how people let perceptions overrule reality. Drew Brees is coming to Seattle on Monday, and he's had to swat away accusations that the Saints are not a good road team. With a bit of a shit-eating grin, Brees remarks that no other NFL team has more road wins since 2009 than New Orleans. Yes, even the best NFL road team over the past 4 years gets shit for losing a road game here and there.

Now, obviously UW is not a good road team and I'm not making that comparison. I'm just saying that if you fired coaches for not being gangbusters on the road, you wouldn't have a lot of coaches hanging around very long. Winning on the road, especially in 2013 during a season where a lot of people are saying the Pac-12 might be the toughest conference top to bottom, isn't something you assume to be a part of competent coaching.

Also, I think UW's losses had a lot less to do with location and more to do with matchups and randomness. ASU was a matchup nightmare and would have probably dominated UW even in Seattle. Stanford was a tough matchup as well and yet if not for some spotty officiating maybe UW wins a tight game (they outgained Stanford by 200 yards and lost). UCLA had some atrocious officiating and UCLA was unsustainably efficient in critical situations (red zone, etc).

I think ASU exposed our OL and QB and that has people aiming their crosshairs at Sark while smashing the panic button. That's all well and good, but what would we ask him to do different? It's not easy to get a better QB than Price, and while we all agree that OL has been pretty bad, recuiting OL is one of the hardest things to do, only a few schools in the nation have great OLs, which is why Sark did what he could and switched to a hurry up offense to mask his OL's deficiencies.

Unfortunately, I will probably be labelled a Sark lover just in time for UW to have a disaster season in 2014 and everyone will say he should have been fired a year sooner. In a way, though I think I am justified in my opinion, I have been tempted to keep it to my lonesome as next year could very likely justify the Sark hate unless Miles has a transformative experience this offseason.

 

[seahawk2k]

Disappointing loss, that was ripe to be stolen, but Halliday was not on his game. Good game though, crowd was real lively.

 

[kearly]

Game, set, match. Might have saved Sark's job though they may need the bowl win too. What say you Dawg fans?

Message board kneejerks aside (I'm counting Danny O'neil as being on that level), did anyone seriously think Sark's job was in immediate jeopardy? UW does not have a history of firing coaches quickly, especially in a season where he posted the most UW wins in a decade.

I do think a loss today would have really weakened Sark for 2014 without question, but no way would he have been fired after this season. Of course, he didn't lose.

It really is a shame that UW could actually be pretty bad next season, honestly I would love to be 7-6 next year with Miles, that's how down I am on his skill level.

I love the talent base around the rest of the team though. Entire defense actually looks pretty talented right now, I love our RBs and WRs too. Just get a QB and an OL, and we'd be the USC of the north. My only gripe with Sark is that he seems to struggle recruiting in those areas. Even the big gets he's gotten at those spots have not impressed.

 

[Throwdown]

I will give some props to Mike Leach though, dudes for real. WSU still has work to do but they're on the right track, hope they go bowling.

But.... Y'all lost so I'm gonna tell you coug fans that the cougs suck anyway

 

[kearly]

I thought Leach did a solid job but I have a few quibbles.

At one point he burned a timeout in a tight game to avoid a delay of game on 3rd and 25, whilst being a country mile away from field goal range. The next play, he called a routine checkdown for field position. Basically, he lit a precious 2nd half timeout on fire for five yards of field position before a punt.

I also thought he should have run the ball more. UW took advantage of WSU being one dimensional, and it's hardly a coincidence that WSU's offense clicked the most when they ran the ball even a little.

That RB for WSU, whoever he is, he's got some speed and some quickness. In the right kind of offense he could be a bright spot.

 

[davidonmi]

I thought Leach did a solid job but I have a few quibbles.

At one point he burned a timeout in a tight game to avoid a delay of game on 3rd and 25, whilst being a country mile away from field goal range. The next play, he called a routine checkdown for field position. Basically, he lit a precious 2nd half timeout on fire for five yards of field position before a punt.

I also thought he should have run the ball more. UW took advantage of WSU being one dimensional, and it's hardly a coincidence that WSU's offense clicked the most when they ran the ball even a little.

That RB for WSU, whoever he is, he's got some speed and some quickness. In the right kind of offense he could be a bright spot.

mason was running well. I don't care what system you're running they need to get him more touches

 

[zifnab32]

It really is a shame that UW could actually be pretty bad next season, honestly I would love to be 7-6 next year with Miles, that's how down I am on his skill level.

UW really doesn't lose anyone other then Price (and I'm hoping Sankey for his sake) and has a really, really weak OOC schedule. They should be able to sleepwalk to 8 wins.

 

[jkitsune]

Game, set, match. Might have saved Sark's job though they may need the bowl win too. What say you Dawg fans?

Message board kneejerks aside (I'm counting Danny O'neil as being on that level), did anyone seriously think Sark's job was in immediate jeopardy? UW does not have a history of firing coaches quickly, especially in a season where he posted the most UW wins in a decade.

I do think a loss today would have really weakened Sark for 2014 without question, but no way would he have been fired after this season. Of course, he didn't lose.

It really is a shame that UW could actually be pretty bad next season, honestly I would love to be 7-6 next year with Miles, that's how down I am on his skill level.

I love the talent base around the rest of the team though. Entire defense actually looks pretty talented right now, I love our RBs and WRs too. Just get a QB and an OL, and we'd be the USC of the north. My only gripe with Sark is that he seems to struggle recruiting in those areas. Even the big gets he's gotten at those spots have not impressed.

I think Sark's job could've been in jeopardy had he finished 7-6 again, yes, I do. I don't think he'll be fired at 8-5, but it will be a frustrating end to the season.

What makes the topic of Sark hard for me is that he's really not a bad coach. He's not a great coach, and I would argue he's not necessarily even a 'very good' coach... but he's at least above average. And he has done a ton for this program since arriving. The team has improved every year he's been here, but the record has not substantially improved (bowl game pending). I don't know what to make of that. Is that bad luck? Is that us over-rating the talent on our roster? Is Sark not a good enough coach to maximize the talent he has? I don't really know, and I have no idea how to measure that.

Losses to UO and Stanford don't bug me. It's the other atrocious losses year in and year out that start to wear on me, and I don't know how to fix that. This was supposed to be the year UW overcame those, and it wasn't. I'll agree with you, Kip, that change for the sake of change is not generally a good thing, and unless there really is a top-tier coach out there who the school KNOWS wants to come to UW, firing Sark could end up being a step back. On that basis alone, I don't begrudge the school for keeping Sark. He's an above average coach, and he loves being here. He's a great recruiter and has put together a good staff. I just don't know that I'm convinced that he can translate it to greatness on gameday.

At any rate, I disagree that UW is going to limp to 7-6 next year behind Miles. This team is not likely to lose that many key pieces. ASJ may go, although he may return to try to regain some of the luster lost by his off the field issues and slow start. Kasen will stay given his injury. Our receivers are intact otherwise. The OL will lose one or two, I think, but no one particularly important. Price will be gone. Sankey may go, and that will be heartbreaking, but Callier, Cooper, and Washington are all talented backs behind him.

On defense, I think Parker is the only major graduating senior, but I could very well be wrong on that. We've got a lot of quality kids behind our starters though, too.

Losing Price hurts, because Miles is unlikely to put up the statistics he did, but if this team can continue to run the ball and its receivers continue to get open, I don't think Miles will have to carry the offense the way Price did two years ago (or even last year). That may not fly against an Oregon, or an ASU, but against teams with less prolific offenses, that could still equate to more than 7 wins.

 

[HawkWow]

It really is a shame that UW could actually be pretty bad next season, honestly I would love to be 7-6 next year with Miles, that's how down I am on his skill level.

UW really doesn't lose anyone other then Price (and I'm hoping Sankey for his sake) and has a really, really weak OOC schedule. They should be able to sleepwalk to 8 wins.

On the D side we lose Parker, Ducre, Shamburger, Fuimaono and I wouldn't be shocked if Shelton declares. All very good players / contributors.

On the O side we lose our nucleus: Price, Sankey and ASJ. Kevin Smith will depart as will Travis Coons.

We have a great mix of lower and upper classmen but when you're losing first round talent, and your starting QB, it's going to sting.

 

[kearly]

On the D side we lose Parker, Ducre, Shamburger, Fuimaono and I wouldn't be shocked if Shelton declares. All very good players / contributors.

On the O side we lose our nucleus: Price, Sankey and ASJ. Kevin Smith will depart as will Travis Coons.

We have a great mix of lower and upper classmen but when you're losing first round talent, and your starting QB, it's going to sting.

Great post.

It's the biggest departure of talent for UW in ages, IMO. The one that really stings is Price though. Sark has lived and died by Price the last 3 seasons. Had he picked Nick Montana instead, I find it pretty unlikely that he'd still have his job right now. I see Miles as being not terribly far from Nick Montana's talent level. Good QBs are great deodorants, and I worry that a flawed QB could not only suck himself, but make his supporting cast look sucky as well.

 

[davidonmi]

I said before the season a step forward was winning big games on the road. The only conference road win was a team that had clearly quit. A very hollow 8-4. If we lose the bowl game and go 8-5 in year 5 it is not a step forward. If we win it is a small step forward. This was basically the same outcome as last year except we played 3 bad teams instead of 2 ooc (we played lsu last year)

Downplaying doesn't get much more exquisite than this. Someone's pushing an agenda methinks.

IF I agreed with you, which I don't but if I did, I would focus my argument on how weak next season's Husky team will probably be. The 2013 Huskies are 8-4, will probably be 9-4 after drawing an unranked team in their toilet bowl game, and statistically they have played like a 10 win team. They were a great team this year, to complain about the best season in a decade plus is just flat out unappreciative.

Also, no disrespect but bitching about road savvy is weaksauce. Winning on the road is tough as hell, especially against good teams. UW's record against unranked teams on the road is fantastic, it's their record against ranked teams on the road that sucks. But guess what? Beating ranked teams on the road is really hard to do. If they are ranked, then odds are they are extremely tough to beat in their house.

Unrelated, but I laugh sometimes at how people let perceptions overrule reality. Drew Brees is coming to Seattle on Monday, and he's had to swat away accusations that the Saints are not a good road team. With a bit of a shit-eating grin, Brees remarks that no other NFL team has more road wins since 2009 than New Orleans. Yes, even the best NFL road team over the past 4 years gets shit for losing a road game here and there.

Now, obviously UW is not a good road team and I'm not making that comparison. I'm just saying that if you fired coaches for not being gangbusters on the road, you wouldn't have a lot of coaches hanging around very long. Winning on the road, especially in 2013 during a season where a lot of people are saying the Pac-12 might be the toughest conference top to bottom, isn't something you assume to be a part of competent coaching.

Also, I think UW's losses had a lot less to do with location and more to do with matchups and randomness. ASU was a matchup nightmare and would have probably dominated UW even in Seattle. Stanford was a tough matchup as well and yet if not for some spotty officiating maybe UW wins a tight game (they outgained Stanford by 200 yards and lost). UCLA had some atrocious officiating and UCLA was unsustainably efficient in critical situations (red zone, etc).

I think ASU exposed our OL and QB and that has people aiming their crosshairs at Sark while smashing the panic button. That's all well and good, but what would we ask him to do different? It's not easy to get a better QB than Price, and while we all agree that OL has been pretty bad, recuiting OL is one of the hardest things to do, only a few schools in the nation have great OLs, which is why Sark did what he could and switched to a hurry up offense to mask his OL's deficiencies.

Unfortunately, I will probably be labelled a Sark lover just in time for UW to have a disaster season in 2014 and everyone will say he should have been fired a year sooner. In a way, though I think I am justified in my opinion, I have been tempted to keep it to my lonesome as next year could very likely justify the Sark hate unless Miles has a transformative experience this offseason.

I've never disagreed that the team wasn't improving. But that might just be the problem. Every single year since Sarkisian's been here the team has gotten better statistically (maybe not last year but the defense was clearly improved). However I keep seeing 5-4 as our conference record every year. Why are we outgaining stanford by 200 and losing? why are we not doing well in the redzone against UCLA. Why can't our O-line match up with the best. It isn't randomness. Being a good team and it not reflected in the W/L record is a problem with coaching. I saw on some metric place that sark has been consistently a minus 1 coach and this year he was a -2 coach.
My expectation for husky football is to consistently win 9+ and when things come together once every few years win 11 or dare I dream 12 games. The talent was 100% there this year. 5th year QB, Oline with experience across the board, few injuries. Experience in the secondary. It was all there and that is reflected in your metrics.
Why it is not showing up in the W/L column is a coaching problem. BTW we are not going 7-6 with the schedule we have next year. It's 9 wins minimum which will be seen as progress instead of looking at the fact that woodward scheduled four patsies in OOC. What don james did is absolutely achievable. We didn't win 12 games every year and I don't see why we can't have that same standard. And by all means keep using 0-12 as an excuse even though that was half a decade ago

 

[kearly]

I think Sark's job could've been in jeopardy had he finished 7-6 again, yes, I do. I don't think he'll be fired at 8-5, but it will be a frustrating end to the season.

UW does not have a history of reactionary firings, so no, I just can't see it. Not at 7-6. In fact, I don't think they would even seriously consider it. It would make his seat warm for 2014, but that's all it would do.

It took them almost a decade to fire Lambright, and he inherited an awesome team and oversaw it's gradual decline. Neuheisel was fired because he violated NCAA rules and lied about it, and that was just a few months after he was caught lying about his interviewing for a job with the 49ers. Gilberton was canned fairly quickly, but Gilberton was an outright disaster and he very well should have been fired sooner. It took an 0-12 season to get UW to muster the will to fire Tyrone Willingham after four disastrous seasons.

To get fired by UW, you have to either suck ridiculously bad, lie repeatedly and violate NCAA rules, or be below average for nearly a decade.

What makes the topic of Sark hard for me is that he's really not a bad coach. He's not a great coach, and I would argue he's not necessarily even a 'very good' coach... but he's at least above average. And he has done a ton for this program since arriving. The team has improved every year he's been here, but the record has not substantially improved (bowl game pending). I don't know what to make of that. Is that bad luck? Is that us over-rating the talent on our roster? Is Sark not a good enough coach to maximize the talent he has? I don't really know, and I have no idea how to measure that.

How about we start by not measuring with wins? Not many teams are winning 10 games in the Pac-12 right now.

I do not think Sark is an elite coach. He's definitely not Pete, Harbaugh, Saban, Meyer. But I don't think he's far behind guys like Rich Rod or Steve Spurrier. He's an adaptive mind that is always finding ways to put his existing talent in positions to succeed, and he consistently produces better recruiting classes than the teams ranking in the polls. He took a historically bad team and has slowly built it into a top 25 caliber program. I think Spurrier is a pretty good coach, but it took him about five years to make South Carolina nationally relevant. Some guys are geniuses that can turn crap into gold in no time at all, but those guys are extremely uncommon.

If UW wasn't losing a mountain of talent this offseason including their best ever QB statistically, I'd actually be very bullish on Sark's future, because I think UW's trajectory up to this point has been very exciting to watch. Their yardage and point differential this season is the highest it's been since almost the Don James era, playing in the toughest Pac-12 in a very long time.

Losses to UO and Stanford don't bug me. It's the other atrocious losses year in and year out that start to wear on me, and I don't know how to fix that. This was supposed to be the year UW overcame those, and it wasn't. I'll agree with you, Kip, that change for the sake of change is not generally a good thing, and unless there really is a top-tier coach out there who the school KNOWS wants to come to UW, firing Sark could end up being a step back. On that basis alone, I don't begrudge the school for keeping Sark. He's an above average coach, and he loves being here. He's a great recruiter and has put together a good staff. I just don't know that I'm convinced that he can translate it to greatness on gameday.

Oregon didn't bug me. Mariota was unstoppable that day. Stanford didn't bug me. The officials hosed UW in that game, and I'm not just talking about the overturn on the last meaningful play. UW outgained Stanford by 200 yards. UCLA didn't bug me. That team was lucky as hell on 3rd down and in the red zone, and the officials raped UW once again including one of the worst calls I've ever seen to wipe out a UW TD.

Only loss that bugged me was Arizona State, but even that game was an illustration of how powerful a force momentum is in the game of football. UW looked they were going to blow ASU out after their first drive. Then Keith Price started missing TD passes you or I could make, and the OL had breakdown after breakdown and both OL and QB spiraled out of control. Then you add a few iffy penalties and a Price injury, plus a non-terrible performance by a very good ASU team, and voila, embarrassing blowout loss for UW.

At any rate, I disagree that UW is going to limp to 7-6 next year behind Miles. This team is not likely to lose that many key pieces. ASJ may go, although he may return to try to regain some of the luster lost by his off the field issues and slow start. Kasen will stay given his injury. Our receivers are intact otherwise. The OL will lose one or two, I think, but no one particularly important. Price will be gone. Sankey may go, and that will be heartbreaking, but Callier, Cooper, and Washington are all talented backs behind him.

Sankey will definitely be gone. It's also a ton of other great players, as outlined above by Hawkwow. 7-6 is my optimistic take. I don't think Miles can win a tough game without the defense and running game carrying the team for him.

Losing Price hurts, because Miles is unlikely to put up the statistics he did, but if this team can continue to run the ball and its receivers continue to get open, I don't think Miles will have to carry the offense the way Price did two years ago (or even last year). That may not fly against an Oregon, or an ASU, but against teams with less prolific offenses, that could still equate to more than 7 wins.

As long as Sark is here, we will always be a team that is carried by the QB. Think about how limited Locker was, and Sark still leaned on Locker to carry his team. Sark will try to do that with his next QB as well, but if that QB is Miles, we will only beat good teams when the run game is curb stomping jabroneys and the defense is lights out.

 

[HawkWow]

On the D side we lose Parker, Ducre, Shamburger, Fuimaono and I wouldn't be shocked if Shelton declares. All very good players / contributors.

On the O side we lose our nucleus: Price, Sankey and ASJ. Kevin Smith will depart as will Travis Coons.

We have a great mix of lower and upper classmen but when you're losing first round talent, and your starting QB, it's going to sting.

Great post.

It's the biggest departure of talent for UW in ages, IMO. The one that really stings is Price though. Sark has lived and died by Price the last 3 seasons. Had he picked Nick Montana instead, I find it pretty unlikely that he'd still have his job right now. I see Miles as being not terribly far from Nick Montana's talent level. Good QBs are great deodorants, and I worry that a flawed QB could not only suck himself, but make his supporting cast look sucky as well.

I'd love to have Price for another year. And I wonder if he had another year, if that wouldn't persuade 1 or 2 guys from declaring early. But probably not. I think we agree both ASJ and Sankey go first rd. As much as I love our Dawgs, you couldn't ask, or expect a kid to not declare. Especially a back.

Loved Jake Locker. But knowing what we know now, I have to wonder how ecstatic Sark actually was when Jake walked into his office and said he was returning for his sr year. Had to be some mixed emotions with the superior Price waiting in the wings.

We are definitely going to miss Keith Price. He had his duh moments, and his untimely fumbles, but put the records aside and he's still one of our all time best. @ U-Dub, that's saying something.

 

[kearly]

I've never disagreed that the team wasn't improving. But that might just be the problem. Every single year since Sarkisian's been here the team has gotten better statistically (maybe not last year but the defense was clearly improved). However I keep seeing 5-4 as our conference record every year. Why are we outgaining stanford by 200 and losing? why are we not doing well in the redzone against UCLA. Why can't our O-line match up with the best. It isn't randomness. Being a good team and it not reflected in the W/L record is a problem with coaching. I saw on some metric place that sark has been consistently a minus 1 coach and this year he was a -2 coach.
My expectation for husky football is to consistently win 9+ and when things come together once every few years win 11 or dare I dream 12 games. The talent was 100% there this year. 5th year QB, Oline with experience across the board, few injuries. Experience in the secondary. It was all there and that is reflected in your metrics.
Why it is not showing up in the W/L column is a coaching problem. BTW we are not going 7-6 with the schedule we have next year. It's 9 wins minimum which will be seen as progress instead of looking at the fact that woodward scheduled four patsies in OOC. What don james did is absolutely achievable. We didn't win 12 games every year and I don't see why we can't have that same standard. And by all means keep using 0-12 as an excuse even though that was half a decade ago

First of all, it's simply a statistical fact that any time you have a short season randomness is inevitable. Are Mike Smith and Gary Kubiak -10 win coaches this season?

The UCLA and Stanford games were perfect examples of randomness, IMO. How often has UW outgained their opponent by 200 and lost under Sark? Answer: once. How often has UW given up the insane red zone and 3rd down conversion rate that they had in the UCLA game in recent history? Answer: once.

There are parts of what you said that I agree with. Our O-line is not very talented, and yes that is Sark's responsibility. I agree 100%. I only point out that recruiting OL is FAR from a given in the college game. Only a few programs in college football have the kind of OL play that we got used to at UW in the 80s and 90s.

0-12 is not an excuse. It was context for the off-the-mark Lambright comparison, and it is context for his performance relative to other coaches in the college game.

I hope you are right about 9 wins next season, but I think Miles gets his ass kicked next year against any team that even sniffs the top 25, which happens to be most of the Pac-12. Even KP got beat by most top 25 opponents he faced. I think it's kind of interesting that you are the bullish one on the 2014 team. If they win 9 games next year, will you downplay that as well? Actually, I would probably lay off you if you did, since I don't think next year's team will be a true 9 win caliber unit.

While the coach is ultimately the most important guy in the building and the most responsible, we can't just blame everything on the coach all the time. It's usually not that simple. If you dissect UW's 4 losses this year, the answers that are uncovered do not reveal systemic coaching failures.

Appreciate the convo btw. I'm a little fiery on this topic, for that I apologize. But stuff like this once in a blue moon is nice for staying sharp.

 

[kearly]

I'd love to have Price for another year. And I wonder if he had another year, if that wouldn't persuade 1 or 2 guys from declaring early. But probably not. I think we agree both ASJ and Sankey go first rd. As much as I love our Dawgs, you couldn't ask, or expect a kid to not declare. Especially a back.

Loved Jake Locker. But knowing what we know now, I have to wonder how ecstatic Sark actually was when Jake walked into his office and said he was returning for his sr year. Had to be some mixed emotions with the superior Price waiting in the wings.

We are definitely going to miss Keith Price. He had his duh moments, and his untimely fumbles, but put the records aside and he's still one of our all time best. @ U-Dub, that's saying something.

Definitely going to miss KP. He's kind of a spaz sometimes, but when he wasn't having his occasional meltdown, he just made it look so easy out there.

 

[davidonmi]

I've never disagreed that the team wasn't improving. But that might just be the problem. Every single year since Sarkisian's been here the team has gotten better statistically (maybe not last year but the defense was clearly improved). However I keep seeing 5-4 as our conference record every year. Why are we outgaining stanford by 200 and losing? why are we not doing well in the redzone against UCLA. Why can't our O-line match up with the best. It isn't randomness. Being a good team and it not reflected in the W/L record is a problem with coaching. I saw on some metric place that sark has been consistently a minus 1 coach and this year he was a -2 coach.
My expectation for husky football is to consistently win 9+ and when things come together once every few years win 11 or dare I dream 12 games. The talent was 100% there this year. 5th year QB, Oline with experience across the board, few injuries. Experience in the secondary. It was all there and that is reflected in your metrics.
Why it is not showing up in the W/L column is a coaching problem. BTW we are not going 7-6 with the schedule we have next year. It's 9 wins minimum which will be seen as progress instead of looking at the fact that woodward scheduled four patsies in OOC. What don james did is absolutely achievable. We didn't win 12 games every year and I don't see why we can't have that same standard. And by all means keep using 0-12 as an excuse even though that was half a decade ago

First of all, it's simply a statistical fast that any time you have a short season randomness is inevitable. Are Mike Smith and Gary Kubiak -10 win coaches this season?

The UCLA and Stanford games were perfect examples of randomness, IMO. How often has UW outgained their opponent by 200 and lost? Answer: once. How often has UW given up the insane red zone and 3rd down conversion rate that they had in the UCLA game? Answer: once.

There are part of what you said that I agree with. Our O-line is not very talented, and yes that is Sark's responsibility. I agree 100%. I only point out that recruiting OL is FAR from a given in the college game. Only a few programs in college football have the kind of OL play that we got used to at UW in the 80s and 90s.

0-12 is not an excuse. It was context for the off-the-mark Lambright comparison, and it is context for his performance relative to other coaches in the college game.

I hope you are right about 9 wins next season, but I think Miles gets his ass kicked next year against any team that even sniffs the top 25, which happens to be most of the Pac-12. Even KP got beat by most top 25 opponents he faced. I think it's kind of interesting that you are the bullish one on the 2014 team. If they win 9 games next year, will you downplay that as well? Actually, I would probably lay off you if you did, since I don't think next year's team will be a true 9 win caliber unit.

While the coach is ultimately the most important guy in the building and the most responsible, we can't just blame everything on the coach all the time. It's usually not that simple.

well I am bullish on the 2014 season because of the schedule TBH. First off we have 4 gimmies in noncon so there's 4 wins. Next we have a lot of the 50/50 games at home. Sark has proven he can beat the average to above average teams at home. Stanford loses a lot so I think sark beats stanford. ASU loses a lot as well so I also like us in that game. UCLA is setting up to be a really good team next year so I'm not sure about that one. Cal is garbage, 7 wins, correct me if I'm wrong but I believe we get CU again which makes 8. And then out of @WSU, @UA, and @ORE I believe he pulls out one of them. That makes 9. Which would feel like a hollow 9. However if we were to get upset a couple times maybe a colorado is better or We lose to Stan or ASU at home but we win those 3 road games to win 9 I'd actually call that more progress than the other way around. The next step for me is winning those 50/50 games on the road.

As for the 0-12 it wasn't directed at u it was husky fans in general.

As for Miles u can mask QB defeciency. Look at Auburn this year, get a QB who can run and then put him in a position to do the things he can do

 

[jkitsune]

I think Sark's job could've been in jeopardy had he finished 7-6 again, yes, I do. I don't think he'll be fired at 8-5, but it will be a frustrating end to the season.

UW does not have a history of reactionary firings, so no, I just can't see it. Not at 7-6. In fact, I don't think they would even seriously consider it. It would make his seat warm for 2014, but that's all it would do.

It took them almost a decade to fire Lambright, and he inherited an awesome team and oversaw it's gradual decline. Neuheisel was fired because he violated NCAA rules and lied about it, and that was just a few months after he was caught lying about his interviewing for a job with the 49ers. Gilberton was canned fairly quickly, but Gilberton was an outright disaster and he very well should have been fired sooner. It took an 0-12 season to get UW to muster the will to fire Tyrone Willingham after four disastrous seasons.

To get fired by UW, you have to either suck ridiculously bad, lie repeatedly and violate NCAA rules, or be below average for nearly a decade.

What makes the topic of Sark hard for me is that he's really not a bad coach. He's not a great coach, and I would argue he's not necessarily even a 'very good' coach... but he's at least above average. And he has done a ton for this program since arriving. The team has improved every year he's been here, but the record has not substantially improved (bowl game pending). I don't know what to make of that. Is that bad luck? Is that us over-rating the talent on our roster? Is Sark not a good enough coach to maximize the talent he has? I don't really know, and I have no idea how to measure that.

How about we start by not measuring with wins? Not many teams are winning 10 games in the Pac-12 right now.

I do not think Sark is an elite coach. He's definitely not Pete, Harbaugh, Saban, Meyer. But I don't think he's far behind guys like Rich Rod or Steve Spurrier. He's an adaptive mind that is always finding ways to put his existing talent in positions to succeed, and he consistently produces better recruiting classes than the teams ranking in the polls. He took a historically bad team and has slowly built it into a top 25 caliber program. I think Spurrier is a pretty good coach, but it took him about five years to make South Carolina nationally relevant. Some guys are geniuses that can turn crap into gold in no time at all, but those guys are extremely uncommon.

If UW wasn't losing a mountain of talent this offseason including their best ever QB statistically, I'd actually be very bullish on Sark's future, because I think UW's trajectory up to this point has been very exciting to watch. Their yardage and point differential this season is the highest it's been since almost the Don James era, playing in the toughest Pac-12 in a very long time.

Losses to UO and Stanford don't bug me. It's the other atrocious losses year in and year out that start to wear on me, and I don't know how to fix that. This was supposed to be the year UW overcame those, and it wasn't. I'll agree with you, Kip, that change for the sake of change is not generally a good thing, and unless there really is a top-tier coach out there who the school KNOWS wants to come to UW, firing Sark could end up being a step back. On that basis alone, I don't begrudge the school for keeping Sark. He's an above average coach, and he loves being here. He's a great recruiter and has put together a good staff. I just don't know that I'm convinced that he can translate it to greatness on gameday.

Oregon didn't bug me. Mariota was unstoppable that day. Stanford didn't bug me. The officials hosed UW in that game, and I'm not just talking about the overturn on the last meaningful play. UW outgained Stanford by 200 yards. UCLA didn't bug me. That team was lucky as hell on 3rd down and in the red zone, and the officials raped UW once again including one of the worst calls I've ever seen to wipe out a UW TD.

Only loss that bugged me was Arizona State, but even that game was an illustration of how powerful a force momentum is in the game of football. UW looked they were going to blow ASU out after their first drive. Then Keith Price started missing TD passes you or I could make, and the OL had breakdown after breakdown and both OL and QB spiraled out of control. Then you add a few iffy penalties and a Price injury, plus a non-terrible performance by a very good ASU team, and voila, embarrassing blowout loss for UW.

At any rate, I disagree that UW is going to limp to 7-6 next year behind Miles. This team is not likely to lose that many key pieces. ASJ may go, although he may return to try to regain some of the luster lost by his off the field issues and slow start. Kasen will stay given his injury. Our receivers are intact otherwise. The OL will lose one or two, I think, but no one particularly important. Price will be gone. Sankey may go, and that will be heartbreaking, but Callier, Cooper, and Washington are all talented backs behind him.

Sankey will definitely be gone. It's also a ton of other great players, as outlined above by Hawkwow. 7-6 is my optimistic take. I don't think Miles can win a tough game without the defense and running game carrying the team for him.

Losing Price hurts, because Miles is unlikely to put up the statistics he did, but if this team can continue to run the ball and its receivers continue to get open, I don't think Miles will have to carry the offense the way Price did two years ago (or even last year). That may not fly against an Oregon, or an ASU, but against teams with less prolific offenses, that could still equate to more than 7 wins.

As long as Sark is here, we will always be a team that is carried by the QB. Think about how limited Locker was, and Sark still leaned on Locker to carry his team. Sark will try to do that with his next QB as well, but if that QB is Miles, we will only beat good teams when the run game is curb stomping jabroneys and the defense is lights out.

It looks like this will be a bit of a moot discussion at this point, but while I agree with you that measuring by record alone is not the best way to evaluate performance, there is something to be said for the tendency to fold in away games against non-UO/Stanford opponents. The record being where it is merely is a reflection of that tendency, and yes, I know that not all 7-6 teams, 8-5 teams, etc are created equally. Sark has done a good job at recruiting talent, and is flexible enough to try to maximize his guys' performance, but what do you make of the tendency to lose those road contests that lead to the 4-5 losses a year?

I think as more time separates me from the ASU/UCLA games, the more I'm inclined to agree that losing Sark is not really going to be a good thing for the program, at least not in the short term. Unless we really think James Franklin will come here (and maybe he will), and we think James Franklin is actually better than Sark (not sure I'd go that far), we could easily wind up on the losing end of a move like this. It's going to hurt us in recruiting this year (see: Budda Baker's twitter) for sure, and odds are high that the guy we get is no better than Sarkisian.

UW, as a coaching gig, is not anywhere near as desirable as we want to believe it is - it's a good job, but compared to the big names out there, it doesn't come close.

At any rate, again, seems moot now.