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  1. Yet they're a winning program, which was my point. I was challenging the contention that success is measured by another program wanting to swipe the person or not. I don't think that's a good measure of success; but that's just me.
    3 points
  2. "It takes a village" to build a team this bad. It's not just one factor. The team started to crumble under Bowden and he failed to recruit adequately; the search by the AD was poorly done; the administration has not made the program a priority; the new staff was not prepared for the difficult transition; and the community shows little or no support. At the end of the day, those factors have combined for failure. Miserable failure. To this point, it does not appear the staff had been up to the task, but much more has gone into this abomination than just the perceived shortcomings of the current staff. Marshal through. Fight to keep the best kids here. Recruit well. Bolster the staff. Move on from here.
    3 points
  3. Akron certainly has had issues finding and hiring quality coaches. I don't feel the issue is they have been moving onto new coaches too soon. If anything they have a track record of holding onto sub-par coaches too long. Below is a list of coaches they have had since 1987. Gerry Faust - 8 seasons (1987-1994) (36-49) Lee Owens - 9 seasons (1995-2003) (40-61) JD Brookhart - 6 seasons (2004-2009) (30-42) Rob Ianello - 2 seasons (2010-2011) (2-22) Terry Bowden - 7 seasons (2012-2018) (35-52) Tom Arth (2019-???) Everyone of these guys got 6+ years to prove themselves (besides Ianello). I know there is a contingent here that is still pro Bowden and I'm tired of beating that dead horse so I'll exclude him from this discussion. Do any of you think we needed a 9th season of Faust, a 10th season of Owens, or a 7th season of Brookhart?
    3 points
  4. I agree Yipa, and never said it was...check my posts from when the MAC play began, I said none of the non-MAC games matered. However, I still believe the 11 we sent out and the numbers we subbed n were far superior to the Vikings on the pitch, but saw no evidence of that. We don't move forward into the NCAA with just our stars, we need depth...hence my disappointment at the level of play more than the outcome of the match.
    2 points
  5. Chattanooga Mocs fan here. Reading this thread reminds me of our conversations on our message board the past two years. Arth's teams struggled to run the football, had terrible play on the offensive line, and an overall terrible offense. When Arth was hired in Chattanooga we had just come off of three top 10 seasons (and the one before in the top 25) Arth's hire certainly came out of left field for us, as he was a D3 head coach and some of the finalists were seemingly much more qualified, or at least experienced at the D1 FCS Level - One had built a meddling Big South team into a perennial top 25 program and his wife was from the Chattanooga area so they had ties here. All I can say is Arth must give one heck of an interview. While Arth was not an expected hire, or the one most Moc fans would have picked, I got behind his hire noting his record at John Carroll and that the X's and O's would largely be the same. My concerns were if he could recruit well and how he would adjust to the D1 game. We started the 2017 ranked in top 15 and things tanked from there giving us our worst season since 2009 finishing 3-8. We did finish the season strong beating #9 Samford, then losing to #8 Wofford in double OT, and finishing up the season with a win over in state rival ETSU. Success continued in early 2018 starting off 4-0 before collapsing and finishing 6-5. Poor clock management by the staff lost some of those games. Arth's tenure was plagued by a complete lack of a running game, terrible offensive line play, and an overall inept offense. Defense, which was a Chattanooga trademark under previous HC Russ Huessman, remained very good under Arth, particularly with the inability of our offense to sustain drives and give the defense a rest. One thing Chattanooga fans never could quite understand is that we had been running a spread run/pass option offense and a solid 4-3 defense and Arth changed us to a pro style offense and a 3-4 defense. You wouldn't think you would change things up that much taking over an already successful team. Arth did seem to recruit fairly well so there may be hope for the Zips, the biggest problem is that his most prized recruits never saw the field and most are no longer with the program. Arth did fire his OC and Offensive Line coach after the 2018 season so the OC you have there is not the same one we had in Chattanooga, but it looks like you're seeing the same results. I hope Arth is successful as he seems like a nice guy. We didn't have the cash to buy him out and were shocked that someone hired him away. We had been hoping that an NFL team would hire him away for something as he seems to have connections there. Good luck Zips fans, Chattanooga fans feel your pain.
    2 points
  6. I have followed Akron sports for 40 years including their football, basketball and soccer programs. This year it has been a challenge to watch this team and each week they seem to get worse. But the question I had after turning the game off in the third quarter is whether Akron has truly had a successful football coach that was so good that other schools wanted to hire them. In basketball, we had coach Huggins who was so successful he was hired by another program. Kd was so successful he was hired by another program. (Still think our AD screwed the pooch on that one). In soccer, Coach Lolli and coach Porter were hired away to other programs. Has every Akron football coach been fired never again to coach in a division one program. Have we ever had a coach move on to a bigger or better program? Coach I, Coach Faust, Coach Brookhart, Coach Bowden were all fired and have never been hired again as a head football coach. Are we the graveyard for division one head coaches?
    1 point
  7. I am not a lawyer either. But I did work in New York Supreme Court for 30 years. I have no idea what the contract states. I am certain they could not require him to stay on campus as a janitor to get paid. However, if he is not currently working as a head coach, under contract somewhere (that might require this contract to be bought out?), we could quite possibly ask him to come back, and stop paying if he refuses. We are entitled to mitigate our damages. That is pretty standard. As far as Arth, if he refuses to be demoted and leaves, that is fine. Same money for us either way. At least Bowden, love him or hate him, gives hope to win some games.
    1 point
  8. I believe in 1978 Billy Martin was fired and then came back in 1979 while still under contract with the NYY
    1 point
  9. If you plan on attending the Zips MBB game at Kent on 1/31 6:30pm, this is your chance to purchase floor tickets or center court lower bowl seating. Every seat except one is available thru the KSU ticket office. Anti-Zip quoted from FlashFanatics: "Got my season tickets in the mail the other day... Then got an apology email because apparently they printed all season tickets with the same seat number for the Akron game. Yes, that's the one game all year where your seat number matters because there will be a bigger turnout. That's not going to be a nightmare for the ushers I'm sure..."
    1 point
  10. I am not a lawyer, but to me "termination" implies a separation of parties. Meaning if this happened, we wouldn't still be on the hook for a salary. I'd say he was "relieved of coaching duties". And if we are paying two coaches, we have the right to define that arrangement unless there is language in the contracts that is limiting. I'd love to see the contracts. What akronzips71 proposes here is a creative potential solution. We are far beyond relying on precedent to get us out of this mess. If that requires swallowing some pride and ruffling some feathers, so be it. In the context of the financial position of the University, the football program renders itself a terrible investment, particularly given it's recent performance, future trajectory, and options. Without serious, out-of -the-box thinking, we are looking at drastic changes that could justifiably include downsizing. I do not favor this outcome, so I welcome all ideas, regardless of how unusual...ideas which will likely not come from our administrators who do not have the courage or career flexibility to find a creative, viable solution.
    1 point
  11. Frank Solich was hired at OU when he was 60 and didn't really turn them into a consistent winning program until he was about 65. If he was 25 years younger, he'd have most likely left Ohio years ago.
    1 point
  12. Ohio's Frank Solich hasn't attracted too many people looking to hire him, yet he's still had a level of success at Ohio that we would probably kill for here at Akron. I'm not sure I put much stock into someone wanting to hire our coach as a marker of success. Look at how many MAC coaches have success in this conference, then go to a higher conference and have almost none. To have sustained success in Football in the MAC it's almost like you have to be in it for awhile. Regrettably, we're back at square one at working towards that goal.
    1 point
  13. First of all, I made a comment on a different thread related to Coach Arth and I wanted to clarify it was not directed at him. My comment about dumbass decision making WAS SQUARELY DIRECTED at the UA Board and the ones who ultimately make decisions on spending and the hires at the executive level (including Presidents, ADs, Coaches, Deans, etc.). My comments below are not negative to any of our coaches, I have met them all and believe they are trying their best. I was taught about ROI and analytics in business school at UA – our board seems to have forgotten what all of that means. While I love the new buildings and stadiums, things have to be done responsibly. UA is accumulating a tremendous amount of debt from dumbass decisions. I want our teams to win and go to postseason play more than anyone and I would like to see enrollment up and even become more selective but the powers that be don’t seem to have a clue on how to do any of this. The school has accumulated a tremendous amount of debt, period! That needs to be addressed before you go paying TWO head football coaches at the same time. There is no way anyone could justify to me firing a coach when you still owe him money on his contract? Not in the financial situation we are in. We can't afford it and Bowden was not that bad. Regarding Bowden, if they didn't have the belief in him to begin with…why extend his contract? It was a dumbass decision to either 1- extend his contract to begin with or 2- fire him and now pay twice as much with a new head coach. Regarding Coach Arth, IMHO it would be a dumbass decision to fire him if we would then owe him money on his contract. We have to cross our fingers and hope he succeeds for however long we are obligated to him or if he succeeds, however long he stays with us. When did this debacle start? Around 1985. On another thread, kreed5220 posted tenures and records of our last 6 coaches. If you go back one more year you would have seen a 13-year winning record with Coach Dennison at 80–62–2 and before him Gordon Larson with a 12-year winning record of 74–33–5. Hmmm. Both of these men were loved by the Akron community and loved being a part of it. This whole skid started when Coach D was fired for Gerry Faust!! Things have never been the same. We have also gone through 7 different presidents at UoA during this timeframe ? After all of these dumbass decisions, the board had the solution right in front of them. A gift was with Jim Tressel, Keith Dambrot, Terry Bowden and Jim Dennison on campus. They had a chance to bring in the Akron community with beloved leaders and right some wrongs. Since I joined ZN I have posted my belief that UA would be served better by home grown leaders.....people that want to be here and not just as a stepping stone. If we would have made Jim Tressel President, Jim Dennison AD I guarantee you they would have kept Keith Dambrot and Terry Bowden. You pair those four gentlemen with Lebron James…..now we are talking some serious fundraising and enthusiasm from the community. They are the type of people the Akron community could identify with and get behind. These are men that would have STAYED at UA and would have taken pride in solidifying their legacies in Ohio at UA. They are the type of men that could have figured out a way to get basketball the facilities it needed. They are men with common sense. Could you imagine the reaction of a top football recruit if Terry Bowden, Jim Tressel and Bobby Bowden walked in to their living room?! How about a top basketball recruit with KD, Lebron and Tressel walking in (with top notch facilities)? I realize this is a lot of hindsight but I have been saying this same on ZN since I joined. There seems to be panic with the Board at UA. They are making bad decisions to try to fix previous bad decisions. Leadership is to blame. It’s kind of reminds me of the Redskins since Daniel Snyder bought the team and is now running it in to the ground. It’s all about poor leadership and financial responsibility. So, what next? Learn from mistakes, use ROI, analytics…. Hell, use common sense!!
    1 point
  14. Exactly @ZipsVoice I don't think any of us said the CSU game was a priority. I expect our Zips to show up, ready to play, whomever the opponent and regardless of who is not available. Disappointed that we didn't see that. Although the CSU game would not have affected RPI in a helpful way, it would have given the Zips the possibility to finish the season/MAC Tourney with a winning record. Now, the best the Zips can do is 8-9-2. Could be the difference in getting a 1st round NCAA Tourney home game vs a road game.
    1 point
  15. So in other words you have not seen the contract and have no idea whether this is an option.
    1 point
  16. So, thought this got posted from my phone yesterday, but no sign of it. The Womens' soccer team lost in a heartbreaker yesterday, at Buffalo 2-1 with 1 and a half minutes left in the second overtime. After withstanding a first half onslaught from the Bulls, the defense held and then UB scored in the 85th, only to have Abby Brown equalize 40 seconds later to get it to OT. Heartbreaker. Great season, great job by the staff with a young team. Only 1 senior on the team, so we should expect another tourney berth and who knows? Maybe a MAC star?
    1 point
  17. I agree, but it was sad at one point when he was lying on the field, in NIU's penalty area, after what he felt was a missed call, and his teammates had to beg him to get up...I heard repeated, "Come on Eggy, we need you." He finally got up and something clicked...he raised his game and did everything he needed to do, except for the stupid yellow card for frustration. David is so talented. If he could get past the drama, I believe he would be one of the greatest D1 NCAA players ever and likely an outstanding professional as well.
    1 point
  18. Unbelievable game. Played awesome all game and could not score the goal in which we needed.... and then 3 came at once. That was the best I've seen Egbo play. With regards tie breaker, I believe based on what has happened previously on the womens side, we should host as #1 seed.
    1 point
  19. Agreed. Bring him back. Beg for forgiveness.
    1 point
  20. "Arth's tenure was plagued by a complete lack of a running game, terrible offensive line play, and an overall inept offense. Defense, which was a Chattanooga trademark under previous HC Russ Huessman, remained very good under Arth, particularly with the inability of our offense to sustain drives and give the defense a rest. One thing Chattanooga fans never could quite understand is that we had been running a spread run/pass option offense and a solid 4-3 defense and Arth changed us to a pro style offense and a 3-4 defense. You wouldn't think you would change things up that much taking over an already successful team. Arth did seem to recruit fairly well so there may be hope for the Zips, the biggest problem is that his most prized recruits never saw the field and most are no longer with the program. Arth did fire his OC and Offensive Line coach after the 2018 season so the OC you have there is not the same one we had in Chattanooga, but it looks like you're seeing the same results. " Mocs fan, thanks for your post, but it does not give me much comfort. Good football all starts with the line and our OLine is the worst it has been in years. BTW, we are known for bad OLines. They have been bad for the three years prior to coach Arth getting here. What bothers me is that they are getting worse, not better, as the season rolls on. Coach Z, who is responsible for their play, seems way lost on how to solve it. I do not believe he deserves to be on this staff. This is a results business and the results he is giving us are horrible. Of course Arth is where the buck stops. If he can't lead us to results he needs to go too.
    1 point
  21. I don't know the legality and I have no idea where or how to reach anyone at the U. But feel free to pass it along.
    1 point
  22. The one I think they made a mistake on was Dre Williams. He was our leading receiver last year in the slot. Because of the pro style offense & only having one slot they moved him to outside receiver because they fell in love with Boogie’s work ethic. I don’t think they expected Burkhart to dominate camp. I guess he had like 12 TD’s & more catches than all receivers. Next closest TD’s was like 4. Boogie didn’t do well in games & they moved Dre to slot but he had to make a decision before playing 4 games since he didn’t redshirt he can use this year & still have 2 years left. Mathison ended up at the slot & Hicks outside. It’s really hurt our offense losing Burkhart & Williams. Even losing Morris to injury. Lost 3 of our best weapons & it’s definitely showing.
    1 point
  23. They get their chance in practice. If they can't show the staff that they're better than what they're putting on the field now, good luck playing elsewhere.
    1 point
  24. OK, so here is a plan: Call Bowden and tell him to report Monday to work out the remainder of his contract (if he refuses, stop paying). Name Arth as ASSISTANT HC. If he refuses, stop paying him. Since we are paying BOTH this year and next, we are entitled to make both of them work. Maybe Arth could learn enough to get a D2 job someplace.
    1 point
  25. It would appear that we are the graveyard of football coaches. That points more to the culture than any one AD or president. Culture change is the unquestioned hardest thing to affect in any organization. But, O God, do we need it. Finally, it's kinda ironic that another MAC program has dubbed itself the cradle of coaches. Looks like the MAC has coaching careers covered from the beginning to the end.
    1 point
  26. You could drop to whatever level you want. If the same dumbasses keep making dumbass decisions...it doesn’t matter. In fact, dropping to a lower level would be a dumbass decision.
    1 point
  27. And if he had been at Akron, we would have fired him by year five.
    0 points
  28. I'd love to have a guy like Frank Solich here...and we did. In the MAC, most teams are competitive for the division title until the last game or two of the season. It takes a special kind of poor staff to have us out of the race by the mid-point of the MAC schedule.
    0 points
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