Good luck next year from saluki country

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snoopdawg

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Hello Gopher Fans,
I'd first like to say congrats on your new coaching hire. I've been reading your threads the past few days and decided to give a little info myself about Jerry Kill. I know he isn't the name some of you wanted but believe me this guy can coach football and build programs. SIU was very close to dropping football before his hire. We were one of the absolute worst FCS progams in the country. Our Stadium was crumbling and attendance was a joke. Kills MO is to redshirt his first two recruiting classes. So his first year wasn't exact any different than any other coach we had. But Jerry stuck to his plan and turned around a program that was destined to be dropped. After Kills success, this year we opened up a new football stadium with attendance numbers that were higher than our winning seasons (this year we didn't make the playoffs for the first time in several years). Jerry will always tell you the truth with absolutely no fluff. He is a tireless worker and recruiter. Believe me the gopher football players will be in better shape also. Klein is a very good strength and conditioning man. We have seen a drop off in players being in shape and also their bodies in general especially in basketball. I will have to say I'm now a gopher fan as well as all of Southern Illinois. You will not hear a bad word ever mentioned about Kill around SIU. We are now rooting for Minnesota especially when you play Illinois!
 

thanks for the great post...always good to here stuff like that.
 

Great post,

Posters were being way to negative on Kill when we found out he was our coach. You need to give the guy a chance. He's been a proven winner where ever he's gone. I'm not ready to say that he's the answer, but you have to give him a chance to see what he can do!
 

You may not see immediate results next year. I hope I'm wrong but I would be shocked if you weren't considerably better in year 2 especially year 3.
 

I expect us to be better than 3-9 next year - we had a pretty young team to begin with. There's some concern with the OL and WR depth, but the cupboard is not bare here.
 


Thanks for the post and I hope you come back to visit periodically.

It's great to hear stuff like this from fans and also what we've been hearing from some media members where Kill has coached in the past. It bodes well.
 

Thanks Snoopdawg. Really appreciate the info.

While a great many were surprised at the hire (didn't meet unreal expectations the AD gave us), many of us were not disappointed in the hire. And most have come around after learning about him thanks to people like you and those who know football.

He is truly a great fit with the values this state has.

And good luck to the Saluki's!
 

I expect we will be better next year under Kill. For much of the season it was an open question how much of the Gophers problems were due to coaching, and how much was due to a lack of talent. The last couple games showed that there was talent on this team. The defense was very inexperienced, and should be better than it was this year. Kill will inherent decent talent, and should be able to get the most out of it.
 

year of the gopher said:
Thanks for the post and I hope you come back to visit periodically.

It's great to hear stuff like this from fans and also what we've been hearing from some media members where Kill has coached in the past. It bodes well.
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I will be back for sure. One thing for sure is you guys will run the football. Some of the Saluki fans always griped it was like playing the old Tecmo game offense. But for an FCS school we have had quite a few running backs play in the NFL. Most recently this year Deji Karim who now returns kickoffs for the Jaguars.
 



I always love visitors when they go through the trouble to create themselves a login, and then either have nice things to say or even bring something to debate in a professional way. Much appreciated. We get too many trolls coming in an attempt to just piss people off for the sake of being a jerk. I don't at all mind rivals or opponents stopping in if they want to debate something. And it is always nice to have visitors like you, Snoop. You bring a good perspective on a very hot topic.

Anyway, thanks for the input and I know a lot of the negative vibes around this hire weren't directed specifically at Kill, but at the process and the man making the hire. Expectations got set very high. I sure hope Kill can turn things around. I have seen a couple similar reports where people were talking about how well conditioned Kill's players are. I think I get the point, take a bunch of guys and sharpen them into hard-bodies. If someone has to go through all that work to prepare... they sure aren't going to want to take a play off on Saturday. Seems like a solid approach and it would be great to see a coach actually overachieve here. Fingers are crossed.
 

Just in the short time he's been our coach, it's easy to see that he's a very likable guy. It will be a long process, but I think we'll see improvement every year.
 

Welcome to New Gopher Fan

Thanks for the great post. One of the qualitites that really has impressed me about Jerry Kill is the continued love and respect that the fans of his previous programs still maintain for him. Its like is is a treasure that you felt lucky to have had.

He seems to be a down to earth football coach who really loves his job and is very good at it. He doesn't take any short cuts in his preparation and passes that on through his loyal assistant coaches to his players.Discipline appears to be a big part of his philosophy.I was one Gopher fan who researched Kill as a potential replacement and saw him as a very viable candidate here. He can flat out coach.

I like the fact he is a midwestern guy. He has been in the state of Illinois for the last few years. He is familiar with Chicago area, St. Louis area, Kansas City area, and rural areas in between Twin Cities and these areas.

He sounds like he and his staff have a vision and identity of what their football team will be and I am very happy to have him as our new coach.

Keep in touch on this Board and pass along any insight and thoughts on the Gopher Program.
 

Schnauzer said:
I always love visitors when they go through the trouble to create themselves a login, and then either have nice things to say or even bring something to debate in a professional way. Much appreciated. We get too many trolls coming in an attempt to just piss people off for the sake of being a jerk. I don't at all mind rivals or opponents stopping in if they want to debate something. And it is always nice to have visitors like you, Snoop. You bring a good perspective on a very hot topic.

Anyway, thanks for the input and I know a lot of the negative vibes around this hire weren't directed specifically at Kill, but at the process and the man making the hire. Expectations got set very high. I sure hope Kill can turn things around. I have seen a couple similar reports where people were talking about how well conditioned Kill's players are. I think I get the point, take a bunch of guys and sharpen them into hard-bodies. If someone has to go through all that work to prepare... they sure aren't going to want to take a play off on Saturday. Seems like a solid approach and it would be great to see a coach actually overachieve here. Fingers are crossed.
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I know all about trolls. If you want to see constant complaining (much deserved on our part though) head on over to salukitalk.net and check out the basketball forum! :) We have all kinds of posters there. Some flipped on our football coach this year. We lost 13 starters and had a crazy amount of injuries. At the end of the year we were starting fifth string true freshman DB's and realistically blew two games at the end or we still would have made the playoffs. We have overreaction also!
 



snoopdawg said:
I will be back for sure. One thing for sure is you guys will run the football. Some of the Saluki fans always griped it was like playing the old Tecmo game offense. But for an FCS school we have had quite a few running backs play in the NFL. Most recently this year Deji Karim who now returns kickoffs for the Jaguars.
Click to expand...

I think most of our fan base will be happy with a run-oriented offense (though there are always some people who complain). We had good running games for several years in the Glen Mason era from the late '90s through 2006, including a few years where we were outright dominant in the run game. A complete lack of coherent defense was Mason's downfall but we've missed that running team identity since.
 

Maybe the next time we need a game against a I-AA opponent, we could schedule Southern Illinois.
 

RodentRampage said:
Maybe the next time we need a game against a I-AA opponent, we could schedule Southern Illinois.
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There's some people on salukitalk right now talking about this happening. We have several people that travel to games and get together with opposing teams fans the night before. This coming year a lot of us are making the trip down to Ole Miss.
 

The more we hear about Jerry Kill the happier I am with this hire. I see why Maturi said the process kept coming back to Jerry Kill. I'll be the first to admit I wasn't to excited when I first heard his name. But when you check out his track record and hear the testimonies from people that know him he sure beats some of the premadonnas that were in the running for this job.
 


Oh, I wish I was able to go to the Ole Miss game...there is a lot of talent down there.

I was going to post a nice message on Kill, but snoop took all my thunder. As a displaced Illinoisan up here in St Paul, I have been trying to get into Gophers more...now it's guaranteed that I am a full fledged Gopher football fan. This team got a lot better with some form of leadership finally taking over after the "great recruiter" (sound familiar snoop?) was canned.

Maybe my homerism is kicking in with my new team, but I think this team could easily be 4-2 heading into the Nebraska game. Unfortunately...the season gets a lot tougher from there.

Here's something anecdotal about Kill. I used to work at the Mcdonalds at the SIU student center. A few of his players were eating, and none of them cleaned up when they were done. Our store manager called the coach. The next day, those same players came over, and cleaned the lobby for us...they did it for a week straight. He wins, he disciplines, he gets kids to graduate.

Enjoy him, I certainly have in the past, and plan on doing so for many years to come.
 

Thanks for stopping by. Please understand our AD promised us a "Tubby Smith like" hire a PR splash was important to help fill our new stadium next season. So, we were expecting someone that would be a household name nation wide. A group of former Gopher football players calling themselves SGF put Mike Leach's name into play & timed the release of their Chris Petersen rumor the day before the hire so the fans would be let down once Kill was announced. The goal was to screw the AD Maturi. Sorry Coach Kill had ot get mixed up in a domestic dispute but this is why we were underwhelmed when Kill was announced.

Now that reality has set it I love the hire. Kill has had two losing seasons out of the 17 he's been a Head Coach & we have a lot of mature talent coming back next season. This is not a rebuilding project, we will go to a bowl next season.
 

snoopdawg. Thanks for your report. IMO, this thread belongs at the TOP of the FB Forum PERMANENTLY so everyone can get in on it. Thanks again. Go Salukis! GO GOPHERS!!!!!
 

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