When BGSU hired Dave Clawson to be their new head football coach, the decision to pick him made little sense. In a “what have you done for me lately?” world, his years as a successful head coach at tiny schools like Richmond and Fordham were trumped by a lackluster year in 2008 coordinating the University of Tennessee’s offense to be one of the worst in the country.

As a result, the school had a worse record (5-7) than BGSU (6-6). Tennessee even lost to Wyoming at home, a team the Falcons thumped earlier in the vast rectangular state.

Adding to that, when BGSU Athletic Director Greg Christopher cited ties to Ohio and the Midwest as a key factor in looking for a new coach, Clawson is more of an East Coast native and might have a wacky cousin from Akron, but that’s probably it.

So none of that, from a sensible perspective, makes sense. But from a collegiate football perspective, it makes all the sense in the world, especially when one considers:

n Brady Hoke, a trendy name to go to a larger school after leading Ball State to a 12-1 season, is going to football powerhouse San Diego State of the Mountain West Conference. Hoke, a Ball State alumnus and football captain, is leaving his home for a strange and new world, where the Aztecs haven’t had a winning season since 1998. This makes no sense. My guess is the athletic director told him, “We here in San Diego want you to be our next coach” and Hoke thought he meant the Chargers.

n Auburn University hired Gene Chizik away from Iowa State to be ITS next football coach. This makes no sense, as Chizik is 5-19 after two years as a head coach at ISU.  That’s the last time Auburn’s athletic director lets his daughter pick the next coach on the sole basis of his surname sounding like a very rare Pokémon. To make way for Chizik, Auburn fired coach Tommy Tuberville, who won 85 games in 10 seasons, didn’t have a losing year except his first year at Auburn, and this year, once finished 13-0, and beat its rival Alabama six straight times. Wow, what a horrible coach.

n Turner Gill, as a result of turning Buffalo to a MAC champion, will be rewarded with … another year at Buffalo.

n Syracuse University could have hired Gill, but instead gave the job to Doug Marrone, the New Orleans Saints offensive coordinator for the past three years. Again, this makes no sense, unless he has found a loophole to bring Drew Brees and Reggie Bush with him for one more year. Marrone has never been a head coach at any level, hasn’t coached in college since 2001, and hasn’t even coached in the region since 1994.

n And last, but certainly warranting the fewest words, Charlie Weis is going to still coach Notre Dame, even after the Irish finished 3-9 and 6-6 in the past two seasons. Also, as a reward for playing an average schedule and losing to aforementioned Syracuse, they will play their bowl game in Hawaii. Buffalo will play its game in Toronto … in January.

n While we’re on the topic of bowls, two teams went undefeated (Boise State, Utah) and will not play for the national championship.

Given what par is for the course, this Clawson hiring makes a great deal of sense for BGSU.

Matt Sussman blogs at http://futonreport.net/.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 19th, 2008 at 12:00 am and is filed under Futon Report, Sports.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.