richt to miami is real

            Miami has hired a head coach. It wasn’t good ‘ol Butch. There’s no crystal ball in the future for Mario Cristobal (yes, I know that isn’t the National Championship trophy anymore, but that would’ve been perfect). Not the former NFL coach Greg Schiano either. Not the other former NFL coach Rob Chudzinski. Enter Mark Richt. Miami’s hiring of the former Georgia coach means one of our own will be coming back home. Finally, Miami hired a coach that can coach.

            Since 2011 Miami had been headed by the “good recruiter” Al Golden after he left Temple. Those quotations don’t mean I’m questioning his recruiting ability; He managed to land good recruits even in the midst of an NCAA investigation. He just failed to develop them. We can point to the fact that NFL teams have spent eighteen draft picks on Canes since 2012 (26 since 2011) to know that Golden didn’t maximize his player’s potential while at Miami. The fact that Miami has had a long history in landing highly touted recruiting classes makes Golden’s recruiting classes seem even less significant. And as the old adage goes, “Temple coach equals Temple results.” Want evidence? Temple was in the drivers seat to land a New Years Six bowl as the strongest Group of 5 team through seven games this year, going 7-0 before finishing 3-3 and losing in the American Athletic Conference Championship game to Houston. Instead of a New Years bowl game Temple will be playing in the Marmot Boca Raton Bowl. And somehow I didn’t fall asleep while typing that last sentence (the author finds pre-New Years bowls to be very snooze-worthy). In fact, Temple’s season reminds me of the 2013 Canes season, when Miami won it’s first seven games, got ranked as high as No.7 in the nation, and then proceeded to get the brakes beaten off of them the next three games. What’s more Temple than a strong start to the season and second-half faceplant?

            It’s time Miami got a coach that can actually, um, coach them. Also, does anyone say that Richt can’t recruit? Because if so, you need to go look at his recruiting classes while he was at Georgia. In is 15 seasons as Bulldog head coach he’s had only three recruiting classes rated outside of the top 10. Canes fans know the Miami football program has been renowned for hauling in highly touted recruiting classes (big whoop for you, Golden). However, in the past decade Georgia has had a higher ranked recruiting class than Miami for all but two years (2008 and 2012 Miami was ranked higher, just in case you were wondering). New recruits have taken to Twitter to show their support for the Richt hire. Richt shouldn’t have a problem landing talent. Let’s just hope he gets the right people to develop it. If so, Miami should at least get to an ACC Championship game under Richt. Remember, that’d be a vast improvement over his predecessor.

            Now that Miami has a coach who can coach and recruit, we can shift our focus on getting a closer stadium. Maybe someday. Forget it, who am I kidding. That’s never going to happen.