Coyle needs to go

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phifo said:
If we are going to fire coaches with multiple National titles (Frost) and deep runs in the frozen 4 (Motzko) then it’s time to hold the guy who hired then accountable. Coyle needs to go.
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if you're firing coyle, its for hiring ben johnson, lindsey whalen, and letting some of our premier programs (both hockey teams) stagnate while being out-recruited by our rivals/peers and being really meh and fundraising.
 

You’re right, in fact Motzko is the only Coyle hire to win a conference title.this season was bad but I don’t think it merited firing him. Coyle has Zero championships in basketball, football etc. if we hold Frost and Motzko accountable why not Coyle?
 

phifo said:
You’re right, in fact Motzko is the only Coyle hire to win a conference title.this season was bad but I don’t think it merited firing him. Coyle has Zero championships in basketball, football etc. if we hold Frost and Motzko accountable why not Coyle?
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Because it is apples and oranges. If you coach hockey here, you better damn well be successful. Do you really think that Fleck, or Medved, or or any other coach at the U of MN has the built in advantages that our hockey program has? I could list those advantages but we all know what they are. The product on the ice this year was, by itself, justification for firing him. I am not taking away from anything Bob accomplished. But it was absolutely time.
 
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Looking at his tenure, I'd say Coyle's coaching decision run has been pretty good. Moving on from Claeys and hiring Fleck, hiring Dawn Plitzuweit for women's basketball and Niko Medved have proven or are looking to be good decisions.

I even think it's OK to an extent to give a bit of a pass on Lindsay Whalen. While she didn't have coaching experience, it still made sense to give her an opportunity. She led Minnesota to the Final Four, won a Gold Medal and was part of the Lynx dynasty, on top of being a hall of famer.

It seemed like a coach who had both the basketball IQ and name to attract talent. It didn't work out, but looking back it wasn't the worst hire.

The real stain on his time here is Ben Johnson. Looking at his options at the time, it appears he was put in a tough spot and Johnson might have been his only option. But still, that was a clear negative.

For Motzko and Frost, though, it was the right call on both. Yes, Frost coached a dynasty here and that's fantastic, especially the undefeated season, but that is a decade ago now. It feels like the program was getting left behind by Wisconsin and Ohio State.

I went into reasons with Motzko in other threads, but again, it was time. Yes he accomplished plenty, but he never won the most important prize and the program appeared to be stagnant. Both Frost and Motzko can be celebrated for their success and one can recognize it's time to move on.
 

IceBoxGopher said:
Looking at his tenure, I'd say Coyle's coaching decision run has been pretty good. Moving on from Claeys and hiring Fleck, hiring Dawn Plitzuweit for women's basketball and Niko Medved have proven or are looking to be good decisions.

I even think it's OK to an extent to give a bit of a pass on Lindsay Whalen. While she didn't have coaching experience, it still made sense to give her an opportunity. She led Minnesota to the Final Four, won a Gold Medal and was part of the Lynx dynasty, on top of being a hall of famer.

It seemed like a coach who had both the basketball IQ and name to attract talent. It didn't work out, but looking back it wasn't the worst hire.

The real stain on his time here is Ben Johnson. Looking at his options at the time, it appears he was put in a tough spot and Johnson might have been his only option. But still, that was a clear negative.

For Motzko and Frost, though, it was the right call on both. Yes, Frost coached a dynasty here and that's fantastic, especially the undefeated season, but that is a decade ago now. It feels like the program was getting left behind by Wisconsin and Ohio State.

I went into reasons with Motzko in other threads, but again, it was time. Yes he accomplished plenty, but he never won the most important prize and the program appeared to be stagnant. Both Frost and Motzko can be celebrated for their success and one can recognize it's time to move on.
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I agree with this for the most part. I wasn't disappointed in either Whalen or Johnson when hired. I am surprised however how it didn't pan out. Both of them had been around basketball when hired particularly Whalen.
 

Crosby said:
Because it is apples and oranges. If you coach hockey here, you better damn well be successful. Do you really think that Fleck, or Medved, or or any other coach at the U of MN has the built in advantages that our hockey program has? I could list those advantages but we all no what they are. The product on the ice this year was, by itself, justification for firing him. I am not taking away from anything Bob accomplished. But it was absolutely time.
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Great, name me a successful Coyle hire
 

Go? Both the men's and women's programs are premium jobs and have been left in the dust by peer programs. It is embarrassing there hasn't been a change before this. We have so many advantages over other schools even with the changing landscape of college hockey. I look forward to the future.
 



#2Gopher said:
I agree with this for the most part. I wasn't disappointed in either Whalen or Johnson when hired. I am surprised however how it didn't pan out. Both of them had been around basketball when hired particularly Whalen.
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Fleck has had one “successful” season. Since 2019 he averages 5 wins a season. Take out 2019 and he’s 35-37 in the B1G. We got excited about the quarterback this year. That’s it. You’re calling Medved a success after one year of sub 500 ball in the B1G. Whalen and Johnson were huge misses. Motzko had one flop season. He was wrong about CHL transfers but committed to change that. Name a Gopher coach with more success over the past 8 years. Again, if we are raising the bar for coaches why isn’t Coyle job on the line. His hires outside of Motzko have been consistent underperformers.
 

Gopher football and basketball will always be a joke.
 

phifo said:
Fleck has had one “successful” season. Since 2019 he averages 5 wins a season. Take out 2019 and he’s 35-37 in the B1G. We got excited about the quarterback this year. That’s it. You’re calling Medved a success after one year of sub 500 ball in the B1G. Whalen and Johnson were huge misses. Motzko had one flop season. He was wrong about CHL transfers but committed to change that. Name a Gopher coach with more success over the past 8 years. Again, if we are raising the bar for coaches why isn’t Coyle job on the line. His hires outside of Motzko have been consistent underperformers.
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I would argue Motzko underperformed to expectations. Where is our title?
 

phifo said:
Fleck has had one “successful” season. Since 2019 he averages 5 wins a season. Take out 2019 and he’s 35-37 in the B1G. We got excited about the quarterback this year. That’s it. You’re calling Medved a success after one year of sub 500 ball in the B1G. Whalen and Johnson were huge misses. Motzko had one flop season. He was wrong about CHL transfers but committed to change that. Name a Gopher coach with more success over the past 8 years. Again, if we are raising the bar for coaches why isn’t Coyle job on the line. His hires outside of Motzko have been consistent underperformers.
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Assume you mean 5 Big 10 wins a season, which is still above 500, which is record territory for us the last 60 years. He's averaged almost 8 wins a season overall since 2020 (taking out Covid year). Not saying Fleck is greatest coach around, but he's been competitive every year with great kids who stay out of trouble. There are other much easier targets to pick on.

In the end, I don't think Bob's heart was it it any more. I don't really blame him. Losing a child takes a horrible toll on a person and family.
 




phifo said:
Fleck has had one “successful” season. Since 2019 he averages 5 wins a season. Take out 2019 and he’s 35-37 in the B1G. We got excited about the quarterback this year. That’s it. You’re calling Medved a success after one year of sub 500 ball in the B1G. Whalen and Johnson were huge misses. Motzko had one flop season. He was wrong about CHL transfers but committed to change that. Name a Gopher coach with more success over the past 8 years. Again, if we are raising the bar for coaches why isn’t Coyle job on the line. His hires outside of Motzko have been consistent underperformers.
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Name a football coach at the U who has done better since Murray Warmath.
 

phifo said:
If we are going to fire coaches with multiple National titles (Frost) and deep runs in the frozen 4 (Motzko) then it’s time to hold the guy who hired then accountable. Coyle needs to go.
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Could be one of the dumbest posts on the Gopher Hockey Forum of all time. And that is saying something.
 

upnorthkid said:
if you're firing coyle, its for hiring ben johnson, lindsey whalen, and letting some of our premier programs (both hockey teams) stagnate while being out-recruited by our rivals/peers and being really meh and fundraising.
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He didn't hire him.
 



Bob_Loblaw said:
They are both exponentially more popular and lucrative than any hockey program.
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Might want to check your stats on hockey VS basketball profit.

Also I mostly meant neither will ever compete nationally so coaches just need to maintain just above mediocrity.
 

phifo said:
Fleck has had one “successful” season. Since 2019 he averages 5 wins a season. Take out 2019 and he’s 35-37 in the B1G. We got excited about the quarterback this year. That’s it. You’re calling Medved a success after one year of sub 500 ball in the B1G. Whalen and Johnson were huge misses. Motzko had one flop season. He was wrong about CHL transfers but committed to change that. Name a Gopher coach with more success over the past 8 years. Again, if we are raising the bar for coaches why isn’t Coyle job on the line. His hires outside of Motzko have been consistent underperformers.
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Gopher hockey has different expectations than football. In football we have to play Ohio State and Oregon. In hockey, we should be Ohio State or Oregon.

Everything in life should be considered in context. If you find a townhome for $2000 rent in Brooklyn it's a great deal, that same town home for $2000 on the Red Lake Reservation would be an awful deal. Context. It matters.


As to your point about Fleck being bad because his Big 10 record would be 35-37 if you ignored his best year.

Here are the other Gopher coaches minus their respective best seasons.
Jerry Kill: 9-18
Tim Brewster: 3-16
Glen Mason: 27-45
Jim Wacker: 5-27
John Gutenkunst: 13-25-2
Lou Holtz: 3-6
Joe Salem:: 8-27-1
Cal Stoll: 21-27
Murray Warmath: 59-58-4 (awfully close to Fleck)

Even using your randomly generated criteria for success, Fleck has been the most successful hire at the U, by a mile, in 70 years.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
He didn't hire him.
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If you’re the ad and not making the hires it’s even worse. The bs that he was bullied into it is a garbage excuse. Go ahead and go on the rant, the hiring starts and ends with the AD, no matter which way they were influenced to get there. He also did not fire him immediately after Gabel left
 

bonin21 said:
Might want to check your stats on hockey VS basketball profit.

Also I mostly meant neither will ever compete nationally so coaches just need to maintain just above mediocrity.
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As far as the top number, maybe I'm wrong. The numbers I've seen are that the putrid 2025 basketball team had an operating profit between $5-$10 million and the hockey team had a profit of $2.75 million. Now, this doesn't really matter to me. I like the basketball, football, and hockey teams. I'm just arguing it's nonsense to compare the highly lucrative almost professional sports leagues like NCAA football and basketball with hockey.

That's a weird and aggressive way to say that.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
They are both exponentially more popular and lucrative than any hockey program.
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In FY25, MBB brought in only $2,113,049 in ticket revenue.
In FY25, they posted a $329K profit

Minnesota men's hockey posted impressive revenue of $9.7 million in FY25, a significant increase from $7.8 million in FY24. Ticket sales remained consistent at $3.9 million

men’s hockey was $2.8M in the black
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
As far as the top number, maybe I'm wrong. The numbers I've seen are that the putrid 2025 basketball team had an operating profit between $5-$10 million and the hockey team had a profit of $2.75 million. Now, this doesn't really matter to me. I like the basketball, football, and hockey teams. I'm just arguing it's nonsense to compare the highly lucrative almost professional sports leagues like NCAA football and basketball with hockey.

That's a weird and aggressive way to say that.
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The hockey team is more important than the basketball team at Minnesota. See stats above.
 

upnorthkid said:
If you’re the ad and not making the hires it’s even worse. The bs that he was bullied into it is a garbage excuse. Go ahead and go on the rant, the hiring starts and ends with the AD, no matter which way they were influenced to get there. He also did not fire him immediately after Gabel left
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The powers that be clearly forced him to make that hire. There has been nothing I've seen in any of his other hires that would lead me to believe that he would have even considered Ben Johnson. There is no way someone whose livelihood is decided by basketball program would hire someone not only rejected from Montana and Northern Illinois but was in no way dynamic. It would have been one thing to swing and miss on a Penny Hardaway/Tim Brewster type hire, but Ben Johnson was both boring and unqualified.

As to being "bullied", that's a strange way to put it. Everyone, in every job, occasionally has to shovel shit.

I am not a Mark Coyle apologist. There are many things I think he handled horribly, especially early on. I just don't believe anyone actually believes Mark Coyle sat in an interview with Ben Johnson and thought "that's the guy I want to stake my future on". No way.
 

maroonfive said:
Go? Both the men's and women's programs are premium jobs and have been left in the dust by peer programs. It is embarrassing there hasn't been a change before this. We have so many advantages over other schools even with the changing landscape of college hockey. I look forward to the future.
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They shared the B1G title with MSU in 2024-2025. He had one bad year.
Crosby said:
PJ Fleck, Nico Medved, Dawn Plitzuweit.
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None of those coaches has had anywhere close to the success Motzko has. Talk about moronic posts.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
The powers that be clearly forced him to make that hire. There has been nothing I've seen in any of his other hires that would lead me to believe that he would have even considered Ben Johnson. There is no way someone whose livelihood is decided by basketball program would hire someone not only rejected from Montana and Northern Illinois but was in no way dynamic. It would have been one thing to swing and miss on a Penny Hardaway/Tim Brewster type hire, but Ben Johnson was both boring and unqualified.

As to being "bullied", that's a strange way to put it. Everyone, in every job, occasionally has to shovel shit.

I am not a Mark Coyle apologist. There are many things I think he handled horribly, especially early on. I just don't believe anyone actually believes Mark Coyle sat in an interview with Ben Johnson and thought "that's the guy I want to stake my future on". No way.
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Hes still here and in no way will who you employ as the MBB coach but what gets you hired or fired here.

I’m not saying he turned down other options to pick Ben, but he hung on for too long and extended him. Acting like he didn’t have a role in the whole process is being purposely simplistic.

He thought it could work and hired him. I wouldn’t fire him for the 2 hires, but those 2 coaches are more trouble spots than the OP post (which is the only reason mentioning any coaches at all).

The fundraising and PR is far more the part I think he’s lacking on and the reason I’d move on. He’s overall been fine hiring imo
 

phifo said:
They shared the B1G title with MSU in 2024-2025. He had one bad year.

None of those coaches has had anywhere close to the success Motzko has. Talk about moronic posts.
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I guess I have different expectations as far as hockey goes. Conference titles mean nothing.
 

Bob_Loblaw said:
They are both exponentially more popular and lucrative than any hockey program.
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I was about to say the same thing. Football is a juggernaut for revenue. Hockey seems to have a higher proportion of fans that are 'ate up'. The intensity of the Little Brother Complex can hit OCD levels of absurdity. And I love hockey. The speed of the game is unlike anything else out there. But I'm also not delusional. ;)
 

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