Coaching Finalists of the Past: Brewster, Mason, Wacker

Donate To GopherHole
g1976b

g1976b

Member
Joined
Nov 12, 2008
Messages
175
Reaction score
0
Points
16
As our coaching search presumably winds down and it seems like there have been upwards of 20+ "finalists" or front-runners from time to time, I thought it would be fun to look back on previous finalists to see who has been in the mix.

When we hired Brewster (apparently after the Patterson fiasco), it appeared Pelini, Strong, and Kiffin were all in the mix. We all know how that turned out.

My coaching search knowledge really is limited after that though. Can anyone help fill in the gaps?

Who were the finalists when we hired Mason?

Who were the finalists when we hired Wacker?
 

When we hired Mason we obviously went hard after Bob Stoops, but we also gave serious consideration to Northern Iowa's Terry Allen, who went on to replace Mase at KU and did horribly.

Go Gophers!!
 

Whoever the finalists were I think mason was a great hire at the time. He took a terrible program with no stadium and brought them back to respectability.
 

BleedGopher said:
When we hired Mason we obviously went hard after Bob Stoops, but we also gave serious consideration to Northern Iowa's Terry Allen, who went on to replace Mase at KU and did horribly.

Go Gophers!!
Click to expand...

I remember WCCO having video of Stoops talking with Deinhart in his office. It was dark out and the video was taken from somewhere outside looking in Deinhart's window.
 

KrisHumphries said:
Whoever the finalists were I think mason was a great hire at the time. He took a terrible program with no stadium and brought them back to respectability.
Click to expand...

I don't think anyone would argue that Mason was a solid hire and certainly brought a degree of respectability back to the program. BleedGopher is right though, I do remember us pushing hard for Stoops and that would've obviously been the "home run" hire if it had panned out.
 



Trestman was a candidate when we hired Mason. He was the 49ers OC at the time.
 

My recollections of the backup plans to Mason are the same as the other posters, adding that Stoops had as much as told Deinhart he had no interest in the job, but when Deinhart offered a free trip to the Twin Cities for he and his wife, so she could shop at the MOA, he accepted free trip. But about 1 1/2 hrs. into the interview he repeated 'thanks but no thanks', knowing he would probably get a better offer the next year somewhere else. As for Wacker, another finalist was then Nebraska OC Frank Solich, who had problems continuing Osborne's success at Nebraska. If couldn't survive very long at Nebraska inheriting a successful program, IMO it's difficult to believe he would have fared any better than Wacker at Minnesota.
 

Mason Finalists - Mason, Bob Stoops, Mike Price, Terry Allen, Marc Trestman

Wacker Finalists - Wacker, Mason (turned it down), Tom Osborne and Ray Perkins actually expressed interest...al ploy for Osborne.
 



Wasn't Bobby Ross in the mix back when we hired Wacker?

I will never understand hiring Jim Wacker coming off a 9 year string in which he'd gone 40-58-2 at TCU including a 21-48-1 record in the SWC. He obviously did a sales job worthy of Tim Brewster.
 

Bobby Ross was going to take the job when we hired Gutekunst...Wacker got the job after basically veryone else turned it down...I think they may have gone after Mike Price then too...I know Mason was set to accept...but then Kansas came back with slightly more money and the U wouldn't budge on their offer.
 

IronRanger91 said:
Bobby Ross was going to take the job when we hired Gutekunst...Wacker got the job after basically veryone else turned it down...I think they may have gone after Mike Price then too...I know Mason was set to accept...but then Kansas came back with slightly more money and the U wouldn't budge on their offer.
Click to expand...


Ahh yes, that's right. Danke schein.
 




Bud Wilkenson did interview...also interesting to note...Ron Erhardt (former NDSU and New England Patriots Head Coach) was a finalist when they hired Cal Stoll...Erhardt later turned down the Wisconsin job...the high school coaches wanted Monte Kiffin when Salem got hired.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom