Boynton Beach Fan said

There are a lot of good names here that could be our next Head Coach.
We continually talk about the lack of attendance even during winning seasons.
We need to hire the best coach that can take this established team back to it’s winning way next year, but also a coach who is willing to go out in the community and promote the University and the football team.
Lane was reluctant to do so and we never grew the fan base the way we should have.

Posted On: Dec 9th 2019, 6:38 AM #391890

THIS!

Lane, for all of his quirks, was totally apathetic about building the FAU brand. So he can cry publicly how no one attended our games when it mattered, but he spent more time on his boat than he did working to get people in the stands.

Take nothing away from his ability as a playcaller, he's one of the best. But FAU needs, and will likely always need, a diplomat/coach. That's a tough combo but make no mistake, Howard never ate lunch in his office during his time as coach, every chamber in the area, community orgs, Rotary clubs, etc. I'd bet my annual bonus that Lane never attended ONE of those things in 3 years.

I completely agree, apathetic is exactly how I would describe him. We need someone to be at the drum for us a little bit. Someone to do for us what Scott Frost or PJ Fleck did. 
 I also think Lane’s recruiting was a little overrated. I think he went for the hype more than substance and a lot of guys never made it to campus or didn’t see the field, but casual fans assume that all of our best players were recruited by Kiffin. 
He clocked in and did his job really well, but he coasted a little on the off field aspects. 

Maybe a new coach would look at the market and decide Spencer is the best available guy without being contractually obligated. 

no idea what you guys are talking about…

OwlPT15 said

I completely agree, apathetic is exactly how I would describe him. We need someone to be at the drum for us a little bit. Someone to do for us what Scott Frost or PJ Fleck did. 
 I also think Lane’s recruiting was a little overrated. I think he went for the hype more than substance and a lot of guys never made it to campus or didn’t see the field, but casual fans assume that all of our best players were recruited by Kiffin. 
He clocked in and did his job really well, but he coasted a little on the off field aspects. 

Maybe a new coach would look at the market and decide Spencer is the best available guy without being contractually obligated. 

Posted On: Dec 9th 2019, 8:44 AM #391900

I will certainly sing Lane's praises for the tremendous job he did here. I do agree with a lot of this, however.

The recruiting was a bit overrated and we tend to forget what a let down last year was imo. This program had all the momentum in the world to build off 2017 and go gangbusters in 2018. There was a sense of excitement in the program and the team went into the OU game a fringe top 25 squad. I get that the coaching shakeups, lack of WR depth and a frosh QB hurt – but we had two NFL RBs in the backfield and a ton of returning players – in C USA. To not make a bowl game at least last year was a major setback imo.

Then you couple that with the horrible UCF showing at home (where we could have stolen some of that momentum back), and the people by and large stayed away. Credit, however, to him and the team righting the ship after that – but the reality still is FAU is a young university (and by and large a commuter school), the football program is still somewhat in its infancy, we have to deal with the horrible soFla sports mindset, and we are a C USA team – so the casual fan just isn't going to care about C USA championships.

It probably frustrated Lane to a degree that bc we are a C USA school, no matter who he was, he wasn't going to get 4-5 star guys out of HS, although he did manage to get the higher caliber G5 type mid 3 star guys by all accounts. To make up for that he went the "free agent (JUCO - Transfer) route which by and large was a disappointment (guys like CRob being an exception, but was a close call).

I'd be ok with Spencer taking over and keeping the momentum, but to your point I don't know much about how he would deal with the important off field aspects, and I am not sure about him from a recruiting standpoint. We have to at least continue recruiting at the top of C USA.

teambeer said

Boynton Beach Fan said

There are a lot of good names here that could be our next Head Coach.
We continually talk about the lack of attendance even during winning seasons.
We need to hire the best coach that can take this established team back to it’s winning way next year, but also a coach who is willing to go out in the community and promote the University and the football team.
Lane was reluctant to do so and we never grew the fan base the way we should have.

Posted On: Dec 9th 2019, 6:38 AM #391890

THIS!

Lane, for all of his quirks, was totally apathetic about building the FAU brand. So he can cry publicly how no one attended our games when it mattered, but he spent more time on his boat than he did working to get people in the stands.

Take nothing away from his ability as a playcaller, he's one of the best. But FAU needs, and will likely always need, a diplomat/coach. That's a tough combo but make no mistake, Howard never ate lunch in his office during his time as coach, every chamber in the area, community orgs, Rotary clubs, etc. I'd bet my annual bonus that Lane never attended ONE of those things in 3 years.

Posted On: Dec 9th 2019, 8:26 AM #391898

I completely agree with your post! It's no secret that Lane is an SEC homer and that is time here was always going to be short-lived because of the opportunity to go back to the SEC. As good of a coach Kiffin is, Kiffin did very little to build the FAU brand. Teams like Ole Miss have been around for over 100 years! they are rich in tradition and Alum who are familiar with Ole Miss football. We are not even 20 years old, hell majority of FAU alum went to FAU without having a football team to identify and associate to so they aligned themselves with other programs that had teams.

I am concerned with this coach hire because we can not afford to bring a coach in that is going to set us back to those 3-9 seasons. That is going to be the quickest way to halt the momentum and support FAU has garnered over the past 3 years.

The second assistant coach is on his way out. RB Coach Kevin Smith may be joining Lane at Ole Miss.

DEVELOPING: Sources say that #FAU RB Coach Kevin Smith (@KevinSmithRB) will not return to Boca Raton for the 2020 season. It is unknown where he will land, but it seems that rejoining @Lane_Kiffin in Oxford could be on the table.

— FAU Owl's Nest (@FAU_Owls_Nest) December 9, 2019

These guys know any new coach will clean house. So how long do these guys stay on? Till the end of the semester? Do they leave now?

These guys will be paid until for the work they do before being let go (or possibly not). So that might be enough to get most of the staff to hold out. 

The bowl game and early signing day are starting to look less promising the more coaches we lose without a replacement. 

I've got to assume that all (or at least most) of the assistants will coach the bowl game.  That is how it  normally works - they may be hired by Lane but return to coach in the bowl game.  Otherwise, we would have no coaches in that game besides Spencer and whoever Lane does not want.

I watched Kiffin's press conference today at OM. It sounded like the only coaches he's bring with is Wilson & Kevin. So does that mean we retain Charlie and hire an Offensive minded HC (Not Taggert)?