Paul Winters

[Doug Snyder]

1. Cares about the program beyond advancing his own career

2. Can squeeze the most out of the talent he's given to beat more talented teams

3. Inspires his players to play their ass off and want to win for him

Paul Winters meets all 3 criteria. Paul Winters gives us the best of the Lee Owens era in terms of unstoppable offenses and inspired play, and I believe would be a much better decision maker and steward of the talent brought in. The 2003 team would be a god-send right now, as was my original point, but Paul Winters could take us back there and beyond.

+1

[GP1]

Owens had two big problems as a coach: He always gambled at the wrong time,

This is becoming a problem now with Coach I.

[Captain Kangaroo]

Owens had two big problems as a coach: He always gambled at the wrong time,

This is becoming a problem now with Coach I.

Owens' teams were in a position to gamble with something at stake.

Losing 35-3? Any Ianello gambles are typically penny-ante by comparison.

[skip-zip]

Ask and ye shall receive

The infamous Howard game notwithstanding, the opponents weren't THAT bad.

And has been stated numerous times, the defense wasn't Winters' responsibility.

We all know the loss to K.E.N.T. to open the season that year put LO behind the 8 ball.

I'll always remember this season, primarily because it became a transition year. And the quality of the schedule was always a topic of discussion after Lee was gone.

The teams we beat may not have seemed "that bad" to you, but here's the numbers again, for reference.

2 wins were against lower division teams. Howard and Cal Poly.

The other 5 wins were against MAC teams with a combined 12-47 record.

If ever there was a Zips team that benefitted tremendously from a really favorable schedule, I'd say that was it.

I think the general opinion at the time was that we were not making progress against the top teams in the league (Marshall blew us out, while racking up almost 600 yards of offense). A change had to be made to give us a shot in the arm, and gain ground on those teams. And I think the timing was perfect, based on what happened over the next two seasons under new leadership.

But I really believe that was only the final straw. I wished it would have happened a year earlier, when we didn't post a win until mid-season against Liberty. I think beating a team with a QB with a broken leg was the only thing that possibly pushed the inevitable off for another year.

[johnnyzip84]

Ask and ye shall receive

The infamous Howard game notwithstanding, the opponents weren't THAT bad.

And has been stated numerous times, the defense wasn't Winters' responsibility.

We all know the loss to K.E.N.T. to open the season that year put LO behind the 8 ball.

I'll always remember this season, primarily because it became a transition year. And the quality of the schedule was always a topic of discussion after Lee was gone.

The teams we beat may not have seemed "that bad" to you, but here's the numbers again, for reference.

2 wins were against lower division teams. Howard and Cal Poly.

The other 5 wins were against MAC teams with a combined 12-47 record.

If ever there was a Zips team that benefitted tremendously from a really favorable schedule, I'd say that was it.

I think the general opinion at the time was that we were not making progress against the top teams in the league (Marshall blew us out, while racking up almost 600 yards of offense). A change had to be made to give us a shot in the arm, and gain ground on those teams. And I think the timing was perfect, based on what happened over the next two seasons under new leadership.

But I really believe that was only the final straw. I wished it would have happened a year earlier, when we didn't post a win until mid-season against Liberty. I think beating a team with a QB with a broken leg was the only thing that possibly pushed the inevitable off for another year.

You could have saved yourself a lot of typing by simply recognizing that nobody is saying LO shouldn't have been let go after that season. The original point by ITZ is that a 7-5 record, easy schedule and all, looks a lot better than what we have now.

[GP1]

Owens had two big problems as a coach: He always gambled at the wrong time,

This is becoming a problem now with Coach I.

Owens' teams were in a position to gamble with something at stake.

Losing 35-3? Any Ianello gambles are typically penny-ante by comparison.

+1

Imagine how bad it would be in seven years.....

[Lee Adams]

I couldn't have said it better myself.

ITZ...go back and look up the teams LO beat that year. A few lower division teams, and some 1-A teams that ranged anywhere from Zero wins to 1-2 wins made up nearly all of those wins. We needed to show that a 20+ games under .500 resume, and beating the lowly teams in the MAC every was not going to be good enough to keep your job here.

And I still want to keep asking this question.....why are the guys who ran this program back then still coaching at D-II schools? I think some things speak for themselves.

I don't have to look it up skip, I started on that team, I know who we beat. My point is, we were competitive with every team we played and we played our asses off no matter what. We were not a joke of a team, we were a team who would go out and play with anyone. I look on the field now and I see a bunch of guys who just don't give a shit. It's heartbreaking and appalling to those of us who wore the uniform, and those also who have sat in the stands year after year supporting this team with everything they have. The lack of competitiveness and "don't give a damn" attitude falls squarely on the head coach. I'm not saying we should go out and rehire Owens. I'm just saying look at what we used to complain about compared to what we have now. My how the standards have fallen.

In my years under Owens, we weren't all that talented, but Owens and Winters were both guys who inspired you to play your ass off. They were the kind of coaches that made you want to run through a wall for them. Was Owens a great coach on the field? No he wasn't. He made some questionable decisions that I feel like cost us some games throughout my career and especially in 2003, where I feel like we legitimately could've had a 10 win season.

Owens had two big problems as a coach: He always gambled at the wrong time, and he did not distribute the talent he brought in properly between the offense and the defense. As an offensive coach, his first priority was always stacking the offense with talent. There were a lot of very talented guys that came into the program during my career that could've played either way. Those guys always went to the offense. I can remember during strength and speed testing during the spring, the discrepency between the offense and the defense was always astounding. Owens didn't place a high priority on defense, and as a result we had defenses who could stop no one. That led to never being able to get over the hump and become a dominant MAC team.

To this day however, I believe that Paul Winters is an offensive genius. We had talent on offense, but he took that talent and brought excellence from it. In '03, Wisconsin's defense was bigger, faster, and stronger than us, but we hung 500 yards on them and were a blown call away from sticking it to them at their house.

We need a coach here at Akron that:

1. Cares about the program beyond advancing his own career

2. Can squeeze the most out of the talent he's given to beat more talented teams

3. Inspires his players to play their ass off and want to win for him

Paul Winters meets all 3 criteria. Rob Ianello meets none. Paul Winters gives us the best of the Lee Owens era in terms of unstoppable offenses and inspired play, and I believe would be a much better decision maker and steward of the talent brought in. The 2003 team would be a god-send right now, as was my original point, but Paul Winters could take us back there and beyond.

Good stuff! The word 'competitive' keeps comong up. I think that was the maddening thing about Owens and to an extent JD. Throwing out the sacrifice games,we usually had an idea that the team could be competetitive if for no other reason they could usually score. For some reason in the recent past defenses here have never consistently been able to control games to give the offense a chance. Now,there is no competetiveness. The defense can't stop anyone and the offense can't score. Whatever Ianello is selling,these guys aren't buying. Whenever the next guy comes in,I hope he has experience as a head coach at the D-I,I-AA or D-II. I thought thats what would happen this time. Oh well.

[johnnyzip84]

I've had a hard timing getting the lowdown on Wayne State's offensive scheme all year, but this article covering the Warrior playoff game at St. Cloud says Paul runs a Pro-Set.