Bowden Expectations (Through 2021)

[Balsy]

Now that it's been established in the Bowden Extension Thread that Bowden's contract has three more seasons on it (18, 19, 20) I think it's fair to start discussing what our expectations are for the Bowden Regime going forward.  Discuss your opinions here; musts and hopes.

 

Since there are three more years on the contract, my expectations would be 

 

Musts, to see progress in this progrum:

 

• 2/3 years bowl appearances
• No season less then 6 wins
• 8-win season (looking at you 2019)
• Another MAC Championship appearance (Win the MAC East outright, not on tie-breakers)

 

Sprinkles on top:

 

• Another Bowl Win
• MAC Championship Win
• 9-win season (here's looking to you 2019)

[LZIp]

I think all of that is pretty fair. The scope of this discussion is really 18 and 19, because we would be in the same predicament we thought we were going to be in '18 for '20, in that its really not realistic to expect a coach to be able to recruit on the last year of his contract, so I would expect something (extension of firing) prior to the '20 season. The timeline is perfect as well for most of us, in that we wanted to give Bowden a few more years to see if he can elevate the program to a real top program in the conference.

 

No less than a 6 win season for sure, another conference championship appearance,  and another bowl win are what I would want to see to consider another extension. I'm kind of on the fence about a 9 win season, but I think I'll throw that in there as well. I'd agree 2019 seems more realistic for that. In 2018 we have Nebraska, Northwestern, and ISU on the OOC schedule and Nebraska is the most winnable. Crazy times we live in! Once again, only looking at 18 and 19 seasons.

[clarkwgriswold]

Very simple:

1)  Don't go sideways;

2)  Don't go backwards;

3)  No excuses.

[Valpo Zip]

Isn't a 6 win season equivalent to a bowl game appearance? 
Either way, I think that the bar shall be two 6+ wins with bowl appearances in both of the upcoming seasons for Bowden to be extended in 2019. That's in theory. However, we all know that if Bowden goes 4-8 next year and comes back with an 11-2 Mac championship season the year after that, we will all be happy to extend his contract.  

 

[kreed5120]

6-6 or 7-5 win seasons 7-8 years into the Bowden tenure just won't cut it for me. I'd like to see us push for a 9-10 win season one of the years. He needs to show he is capable of winning big at Akron.

[UAZippers]

2 hours ago, kreed5120 said:

6-6 or 7-5 win seasons 7-8 years into the Bowden tenure just won't cut it for me. I'd like to see us push for a 9-10 win season one of the years. He needs to show he is capable of winning big at Akron.

I agree, I'm not happy with .500 football from my coach that is now in the latter part of his first decade with the team. 

Edited December 25, 2017 by UAZippers

[Lee Adams]

On 12/24/2017 at 4:01 PM, LZIp said:

I think all of that is pretty fair. The scope of this discussion is really 18 and 19, because we would be in the same predicament we thought we were going to be in '18 for '20, in that its really not realistic to expect a coach to be able to recruit on the last year of his contract, so I would expect something (extension of firing) prior to the '20 season. The timeline is perfect as well for most of us, in that we wanted to give Bowden a few more years to see if he can elevate the program to a real top program in the conference.

 

No less than a 6 win season for sure, another conference championship appearance,  and another bowl win are what I would want to see to consider another extension. I'm kind of on the fence about a 9 win season, but I think I'll throw that in there as well. I'd agree 2019 seems more realistic for that. In 2018 we have Nebraska, Northwestern, and ISU on the OOC schedule and Nebraska is the most winnable. Crazy times we live in! Once again, only looking at 18 and 19 seasons.

I'll take 6 wins in the MAC for starters. Thats a minimum for me. Beat OU and Miami on a consistent basis. OU especially. Have to look out for Buffalo though. That also means you probably have to beat at least 1 team from the West whether it be a Toledo,NIU,WMU or whomever. 6 MAC wins is going to likely put you in good shape to win the East most of the time. Tack on 1 win against a bad 1-AA school you should have at least 7 wins. If after this amount of time 'in the saddle' this regime can't recruit enough roster talent to beat 6 MAC teams 3 out of every 4 years look elsewhere.

[Zipmeister]

I'll predict we slowly move towards playing for more than only two quarters per game.

The only win prediction that is possible at this point is we will win at least two games less each season than we should if our current unimaginative OC is retained (e.g., anyone with a football IQ higher than 80 would have targeted Booker at least three times more than he was this year)

 

Edited December 29, 2017 by Zipmeister
left out a couple of words

[gozips19]

My expectations are simple. Be better than Owens. Be better than J.D. 

Take the next step and be an elite MAC program.  No more excuses.  

[Bruce Willis Drummond]

2 minutes ago, gozips19 said:

No more excuses.  

Why do you want to discontinue Akron’s oldest and strongest tradition?

[Balsy]

13 minutes ago, gozips19 said:

My expectations are simple. Be better than Owens. Be better than J.D. 

Take the next step and be an elite MAC program.  No more excuses.  

 

9 minutes ago, Bruce Willis Drummond said:

Why do you want to discontinue Akron’s oldest and strongest tradition?

 

At least some members are willing to say what their expectations are, verses whining all the time.

[Bruce Willis Drummond]

1 minute ago, Balsy said:

 

 

At least some members are willing to say what their expectations are, verses whining all the time.

At least some members have a sense of humor.

[Balsy]

1 minute ago, Bruce Willis Drummond said:

At least some members have a sense of humor.

 

There is no humor in 

Edited December 29, 2017 by Balsy

[Bruce Willis Drummond]

7 minutes ago, Balsy said:

 

There is no humor in 

Stop doing it then.

[kreed5120]

I found your comment to be funny @Bruce Willis Drummond. Some people are just overly defensive for whatever reason. Being a Cleveland sports if I couldn't laugh about my fandom misfortunes, I'd probably cry.

[blueandgold]

1. I want to see an 8 win regular season.

2. Two, if not three, Bowl appearances with a minimum of one Bowl victory.

3. Consistency on offense throughout entire games. (Not just one drive here and there and then nothing for multiple possessions.)

4. Better Special Teams play.

 

[a-zip]

On 12/24/2017 at 8:22 PM, kreed5120 said:

6-6 or 7-5 win seasons 7-8 years into the Bowden tenure just won't cut it for me. I'd like to see us push for a 9-10 win season one of the years. He needs to show he is capable of winning big at Akron.

Agreed.  I have been a supporter and thought we were lucky to get he and Amato.  I am ready for 8 wins+

[zipsfan33]

1 hour ago, a-zip said:

Agreed.  I have been a supporter and thought we were lucky to get he and Amato.  I am ready for 8 wins+

a-zip thank you for being an athletic supporter of the Zips!   Ummm that just doesn't sound right!   haha  

[Let'sGoZips94]

No more 30-50 pt blowout losses (excluding top 10 teams). 8+ regular season wins. Knock off a P5 school. Last but not least, a competent offense.

[Blue & Gold]

31 minutes ago, lilroodude said:

No more 30-50 pt blowout losses (excluding top 10 teams). 8+ regular season wins. Knock off a P5 school. Last but not least, a competent offense.

Well said.  +1.  Beyond tired of the blowout losses.

Edited December 31, 2017 by Blue & Gold

[akzipper]

I'm still wishing we'd see Akron knock off a ranked team. being so close with Michigan shows that it's possible. Do that and get us to bowl games consistently. 

 

I'm sure we'd all like to see the Zips end up like Toledo, NIU, WMU, etc. But I think we're just too far off for that.

[skip-zip]

1 hour ago, akzipper said:

I'm still wishing we'd see Akron knock off a ranked team. being so close with Michigan shows that it's possible. Do that and get us to bowl games consistently. 

 

I'm sure we'd all like to see the Zips end up like Toledo, NIU, WMU, etc. But I think we're just too far off for that.

 

Although I don't believe that the top of the MAC will ever be unreachable, I do agree that knocking off a ranked team sometime soon and consistently making bowl games would make me very happy with our progress as a program.  

[GoZips88]

On 12/31/2017 at 4:27 PM, lilroodude said:

No more 30-50 pt blowout losses (excluding top 10 teams). 8+ regular season wins. Knock off a P5 school. Last but not least, a competent offense.

 

+1 Nailed it.

 

Bowden and Milwee need to make like the Chinese and steal what the best offensive programs are doing. We may not have the horses at times to pull it off as well as the better programs do but can we at least look the part on offense game in and game out?  

 

[Balsy]

12 hours ago, akzipper said:

I'm still wishing we'd see Akron knock off a ranked team. being so close with Michigan shows that it's possible. Do that and get us to bowl games consistently. 

I'm sure we'd all like to see the Zips end up like Toledo, NIU, WMU, etc. But I think we're just too far off for that.

 

11 hours ago, skip-zip said:

Although I don't believe that the top of the MAC will ever be unreachable, I do agree that knocking off a ranked team sometime soon and consistently making bowl games would make me very happy with our progress as a program.  

 

Between these opponents:

 

2018:  Nebraska, Northwestern, Iowa State

 

2019:  Illinois, UAB, Troy

 

2020: UAB, Clemson

 

I don't see it happening through 2021.  I agree it's a goal, but there's a little luck involved.  The last couple of years the ranked team that we've played that year has been, frankly, a championship caliber team.  Having the Expectation of a MAC team beating a National Championship team isn't realistic. 

 

We got lucky with the 2013 matchup with Michigan; they were clearly over-rated and we got them at the time of the year before the rest of the country realized they were overrated.  We might get lucky between Nebraska, Northwestern and Illinois that one of them will be in a similar situation...less likely with Iowa State, UAB and Troy.

 

I think we need to focus first on beating a Big-10 team.  Any Big-10 team.  And within the next two years we have the opportunity....NEBRASKA!  Nebraska seems to be the lowest hanging fruit.  They lost to NIU this year, and are as much a bottom dweller of the Big-10 as we have faced in recent memory.

 

Beat Nebraska, and then find a way to get a 9-win season in 2019.

[skip-zip]

14 minutes ago, Balsy said:

2019:  Illinois, UAB, Troy

I don't see it happening through 2021. 

 

ALL of those teams on the 2019 slate are beatable.  Illinois absolutely stinks, and we just came within a first down of icing a game against Troy on the road this year. 

 

But...none of those teams will be ranked when we play them.  Guaranteed.