I am a true gopher fan, I unlike others on this board do not attack others (other than PA) which I think is a testament to their individual intelligence and lack of maturity. I contribute multiple sources to the U of M for various activities such as advertising, general fund and most importantly in my eyes athletics. With that I have a number of people who weekly if not daily keep in contact with me. Let me say the I know for a fact the search did not go well but I think Kill was still a good hire and has a chance to win here. As far as the search I simply was not in a position to mention names due to the fact of who I have regular contact with. I can tell you that I was on one occasion told that the new coach was to be signed, sealed and soon to be delivered and that coach was not Kill. Take that as you will, secrecy was not meant to torment but purely for protection for individuals. I believe the AD when he says Kill was always a possibility but he was certainly not in their original top 8.
Personally I don't doubt any of that, as a matter of fact I don't doubt that a coach was signed and backed out because his school ponied-up or he thought a better job was opening. What I doubt and what
people all over the country doubt is that when push came to shove a big name or big demand coach was going to come here until
after the Gophers strung together a number of winning seasons and not before.
Thinking that Maturi or any A.D would change that was a bad idea and it's hard to believe that any rational person could think otherwise unless they believe that coaches always tell the truth or honor their commitments.
It's not personal, it's just that past experience strongly favors the "no big name to the U" and "coaches lie" approach. There are just to damn many years of futility and examples to ignore. No amount of hatred or disappointment towards Maturi or Bruininks will change that for a lot of us.
What bothers me still is the feeling that "boy, if only Maturi wasn't handling things Hoke would have turned down the new SDSU money or Peterson would dump Boise State to take a chance on TCF".
Those feelings are beyond understanding in the rest of the country and irritating here.
That said, I didn't think that Kill would have been considered regardless of how strong his track record was because of health concerns, so I hope you're right about Kill being a good hire for all our sakes. Though honestly, reading the board the last three days there are still a bunch of guys who will be praying that Kill fails just so they can keep saying "See Maturi sucks!"
