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Mike Riley!! A great move for Nebraska. They are now in the Pac-13!!!
CharlesMincy
Member Posts: 44
The Mike Riley hire moves Nebraska close to the West Coast. It is a no brainer for them. Nebraska has suffered in recent years because they are positionally landlocked away from the best "watering holes" when it comes to recruiting. Finding a coach with tentacles and roots firmly planted in the recruiting wars in the Wild West is major. Mike Riley made Oregon State respectable. What do you think he will do at NEBRASKA????!!!!
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I think Riley a decent coach, but the goal at Nebraska isn't to be decent. They have been pretty good under Pelini, but he plateaued at 9-10 wins. There is nothing to suggest Riley can win a championship. If UW hired Riley instead of Petersen, I would probably be pissed. Nebraska's standards are probably even higher than UW's. How does Riley measure up to Urban Meyer, Mark Dantonio, or even Gary Andersen at Wisconsin?
To me, this hire screams that Nebraska was tired of Pelini's antics and hired the anti-Pelini, mild mannered good guy in Mike Riley.
Either way, this will be interesting to watch.
Who knows whether Riley will be the answer at Nebraska. He deserves time to let it play out. It's entirely possible that he plateaued at Oregon State, got a little too comfortable, and the results were what they were.
What we do know was that Pelini WASN'T the answer at Nebraska. He was average to slightly above average for them. He tended to have his teams not show up in the biggest of the games.
To me, it's fair to question whether Riley has the chops to get to a higher level than Pelini. But I applaud Nebraska for making the hard move of knowing that the guy they had wasn't the answer and being willing to make the tough decision to try to find better.
In many ways, if it wasn't for PatHadenFS, it would have been the position that the UW was going to be under with Seven Win Steve in the coming years.
Nebraska offers a unique experience. They recruit nationally because they have to AND because they can.
Overall, he seems like an above average coach who couldn't get over that hump (2008,2009,2012) when his teams had a shot to win the league.
The hire is a bad one because he's 61. He should have left after 2009. Then he'd have had a good 10 years left. Its a great move for Riley. His legacy in OSU is secure. He realized he wasn't going to win being at OSU and having to face a strong Stanford, Oregon, Petersen, Rich Rod, Graham and USC and UCLA. Nebraska hasn't won a conference title since 1999. A 15 year drought. If Riley can win just one then thats a great way for him to go out.
He never impressed me as a recruiter, either. If anything I think he did a better job recruiting Texas (Rogers bros, Yvenson Bernard, Storm Woods). He picked up Cooks and Mannion after they ran away from verbal commitments Neuheisels pistol offense. In my opinion he's running away from 4 years of poor recruiting in Corvallis. Least talented team in pac12 this year, and will be again next year.
I think he was a pretty good coach a few years ago. Developed QBs and I liked his multiple look offenses. His teams always seemed to start slow, then pick it up before getting destroyed by the ducks. I kind of thought he looked over the hill this year. His best years are clearly behind him.
In terms of recruiting, Oklahoma does the best job out west, then ND, then maybe Nebraska.
Reality is that OS should never, EVER leave the AD of Nebraska off of their Xmas list.