Future of Gopher Football

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lakesgopher

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I was and still am a Brewster supporter! But I think our program is never going to be able to achieve greatness unless we go out and hire a "Lou Holtz" type coach. I am a coach and I come from a very large coaching family. I have been apart of H.S. staffs that come in for programs that have never been successful in their histories. I have seen what happens to young kids when losing is the norm and I have seen how hard it is to beat the negativity out of kids. That is why I have and always believed Brew is perfect for Minny! He is up-beat and positive. It takes a lot of time and energy to dismantle negativity! And it's always easier to hate/be angry/negative towards something rather then keep to the positive path. Like I said I am a Brewster guy, however, this program will not be successful until we bring in a coach who is above criticsm. It hurts me to say that because I love the U and the state of Minnesota, but as a fan base we suck! Look at how long we supported a guy who was content upon being average. And then people try to defend the fact that he was a good coach...He was very poor against Big Ten teams and very good against bad competition! Great job Mason!

Our fan base is brutal! We can't fill the student section in a brand new stadium that is quite small for Big Ten standards. We are in one of the biggest populations of all the schools in the Big Ten(city as well as student body)

The "Fire Brew" morons who spit these comments that he is a "bad coach" etc etc really dont see that the Minnesota Football Program is not a 3 year fix! Unfortunately many will believe that it is a 2-3 year fix for whoever becomes the new coach due to the fact Brew has built a decent amount of depth and if/when a new regime comes through the doors the rebuilding process is going to be much quicker! And the Brew Haters will all say, "see i told you so, it just took someone who knows what they're doing!" When in reality Brew did all the heavy lifting.

Losing recruits will keep happening and the big money alum are going to push Maturi to take action. Many of you believe that losing recruits is something that never happens and this is a chock that kids can't make up their minds. How dillusional are some of you? Dropping the U of MN for Oregon or TCU right now makes perfect sense. I mean both fan bases have had their ups and downs but you never here the negative rhetoric that you hear out of MN. But neither school has been as irrelevant as Minny over a 40 year stretch.

Kfan, Star Trib, Pioneer Press-Every one of us love to piss and moan about how negative these companier portray our school and athletics. When are we going to do something about it? Im just as bad as the majority of us, I hate them but I listen anyways because of the lack of local coverage. If we exect greatness out of our athletic programs why do we consistantly listen to these idiots that tell us how we will never be?
 

+1. Agree with everything here, but realize that Brewster may be behind an 8-ball bigger than the Rock of Sisyphus.

Mason has his proponents and detractors on this board and I am firmly in the camp of the latter. The guy could coach. No question about that. But the rift that occured between the high school football community and the University of Minnesota football program during his tenure is something that has to be repaired and Brewster is doing just that.

As for Brewster as a head coach, I just don't think he was prepared enough or, as you state, had the stature to stare down his doubters in the early going and, as a result, his base of support has dwindled. I have never doubted his work ethic, however, and if he's fired and a new guy comes in, he'll be inheriting a better situation than the one Brewster did.

My only real problem with Brewster is that he appears silly at times. He's buttoned things down a bit more, especially on the sideline, and has become more businesslike. But he still says and does some odd things that give his opponents grist for the mill.
 

50PoundHead said:
+1. Agree with everything here, but realize that Brewster may be behind an 8-ball bigger than the Rock of Sisyphus.

Mason has his proponents and detractors on this board and I am firmly in the camp of the latter. The guy could coach. No question about that. But the rift that occured between the high school football community and the University of Minnesota football program during his tenure is something that has to be repaired and Brewster is doing just that.

As for Brewster as a head coach, I just don't think he was prepared enough or, as you state, had the stature to stare down his doubters in the early going and, as a result, his base of support has dwindled. I have never doubted his work ethic, however, and if he's fired and a new guy comes in, he'll be inheriting a better situation than the one Brewster did.

My only real problem with Brewster is that he appears silly at times. He's buttoned things down a bit more, especially on the sideline, and has become more businesslike. But he still says and does some odd things that give his opponents grist for the mill.
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In my mind brew was hired for more then his recruiting abilities! I think his attitude and passion is what sold maturi on him! maturi knows the attitude around the state towards gopher football. its a program built for second tier minnesota athletes. and thats the way mason treated this program. mason didnt beat anyone other then penn st...for some reason mason was able to beat paterno and i have yet to figure out how the hell he did it. during the 2000's their were many many games that really disappointed me and still annoy me to think about. mason did his job building up from wacker, but in my mind mason should have been here for 5-6 years not 10
 

For a program like the University of Minnesota, the coach has two primary jobs: (1) on-field performance and (2) ambassador to the state's football program. With pass/fail grading, I give Mason passing grades on (1) and the biggest failing grade possible on (2).

You hit it on the head. Under Mason, the state's top football players had no interest in attending the U. Strange thing is, he actually turned down some players who actually went on to play well at other FBS schools. I work around school districts and talk with superintendents and athletic directors on a somewhat regular basis. The name "Mason" never evokes good feelings.

Brewster was hired as much for (2) as (1) in my estimation. The problem is, it's starting to look like he is going to be the obverse of Mason in that he may never quite click as an on-field coach. We probably need a big name who can install (ala Holtz) someone like Vinny Cerrato as recruiting coordinator. We have to find someone who can build the program from the bottom up.
 

lakes
Mason should have won two BT crowns; 99 & 03. The talent level on those teams was outstanding. I gave up on Mason in 2004 and realized he would never get us beyond mediocrity.
 



Bayfieldgopher said:
lakes
Mason should have won two BT crowns; 99 & 03. The talent level on those teams was outstanding. I gave up on Mason in 2004 and realized he would never get us beyond mediocrity.
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Agreed and agreed. That said, a bit of Mason's stubborn attitude toward what he wanted to do on the field wouldn't have hurt Brewster. The guy has been too willing to define and redefine his team's identity which inevitably leads to none at all.
 

maxwellsmart said:
Agreed and agreed. That said, a bit of Mason's stubborn attitude toward what he wanted to do on the field wouldn't have hurt Brewster. The guy has been too willing to define and redefine his team's identity which inevitably leads to none at all.
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i dont know how i could agree on the winning big ten titles comment due to the fact we ended up in 5th place both in 99 and 03
 

maxwellsmart said:
Agreed and agreed. That said, a bit of Mason's stubborn attitude toward what he wanted to do on the field wouldn't have hurt Brewster. The guy has been too willing to define and redefine his team's identity which inevitably leads to none at all.
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I keep playing with that notion myself. It seems to me that Brewster thought the spread (run and shoot II) was the way to go and he brought in Dunbar to run it. Then last year he seemed to come to three realizations.

1. That he wasn't going to be able to bring in enough guys to make the spread work. He knew he wasn't recruiting to Texas but I bet he found out that it was even more difficult then recruiting to North Carolina.

2. Winning the Big Ten was the holy grail around here. If you're going to do that you have to beat Ohio State, Iowa, Wisconsin, Penn State and Michigan. You've got to have more then just a semblance of a run game to do that.

3. He really couldn't stand Dunbar and Dunbar was not about to change his style anyway.

That meant getting a new Coordinator. His top two choices turned him down. It also meant trying to establish a solid running game with 180 -200 pound backs. Though, if I'm not mistaken, he had a very solid RB recruited who couldn't get into school.

He main faults to me are two fold: He's inexperienced and he's use to getting his way.

Both are correctable.
 



Brewster should have never hired Dunbar, but my guess is because he had never been a head coach, he thought having a former head coach on the staff was a good idea. And it might have been if the person who had previously been a head coach would have realized that he wasn't the head coach at this particular point in time.

To me, Brewster made two outstanding hires in Cross and Butler. The rest of the staff falls in the okay department for me. He should have taken his time to figure out what his vision was for the football team and recruit assistants that would buy into that vision and then build the team identity around that vision. Instead, the whole thing seemed to be thrown together so quickly to get Brewster out on the recruiting trail like a jackrabbit to do what he likes to do and what he probably does best. But as anyone who has ever built any organization knows, you have to build the foundation (the tedious, hard, and necessary work) before you get to do what you like.
 

lakes'.....

What he's trying to say about 1999 and 2003 was that the Gophers came very, very
close both years. In 1999, had they beaten Wisky in OT rather than lost (20-17 in the Dome),
the Gophers would have tied and went to the Rose Bowl.

2003 is very fresh on our memories. Had we hung on against Michigan in a game that
I believe was just one bad fade pass call from winning, it would have carried over to the
next week vs MSU, and hence, the Big 10 title. All three losses mentioned here happened
in the Dome, which is a whole 'nuther topic! LOL

So, the 5-3 records and 5th place finishes are somewhat deceptive as to just how
close they came.
 

I think the switch from the spread was because he had no offensive line that could run or pass block. If he had stayed with the spread another year he would have had no QB because of the punishment Weber would have taken. The other issue was Gray was not able to learn the QB position as fast as planned and his ball security was lacking.
 

The spread was a radical change from the previous offense. Brewster thought that he could recruit into making the offense work. Then we made another radical change to an extremely complex pro-style offense. Pro players have enough trouble learning that, and most of these players aren't going to the NFL. I don't think we can afford another wholesale radical change in the offense, but I hope we can simplify the offense to the things that the players can do well.

I'm not suggesting that we make the wishbone our base offense or anything like that, but with Gray as QB, I think mixing in some option would be pretty sweet.
 



He could have gone to the spread without hiring Dunbar, who is extremely stubborn and resists any alteration of his version of the spread. It was just a more mismatch in personality.
 

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