So congrats to the guys over at EDSBS (who will probably be waking up this morning from mother of all hangovers), Swamp Ball, and rest of Gator nation. The Urbanator brings home a national championship just in his second season at the University of Florida. That's right. It took him only two years to turn around a program that was coming off a 7-5 season (Ron Zook's last season) into a national champion. So much for the argument from Dorrell lovers that a coach should get least 5-6 years to prove he can turn around a program.
What is the tragedy of this whole story if you are Bruin football fan?
UCLA could have at least made an effort to hire Urban Meyer in 2002 right after they fired Bob Toledo (or before, then when writing was on the wall). Do you remember how Utah hired Urban Meyer in December of 2002 when UCLA was in the market for a new football coach? We could have hired (or at least made an effort to hire) Urban, but we ended up with clueless Karl:
AP Photos
Utah hired Meyer just days after UCLA fired Toledo. So shouldn't alums, students, and season ticket holders of UCLA football ask the mendacious bureaucrats at Morgan Center if there was even an effort made to reach out to Coach Meyer in 2002, and bring him to Westwood for an interview?
Keep in mind that right after UCLA fired Toledo, a lot of UCLA fans in the message boards were calling for Urban Meyer. My colleague on BN - Odysseus - who is a graduate of Notre Dame law school had been raving about Meyer's work at Bowling Green all through the difficult years of '00-02. But, apparently, UCLA officials didn't even bother contacting Meyer.
Utah ended up hiring Meyer for a salary which was at the same or lower level for UCLA paid for a loser like Karl Dorrell. We all know now what Meyer did at Utah. He turned a 5-6 football program into a 10-2 one, in his very first season before turning them into the original Boise State of the BCS, leading them to a 12-0 Fiesta Bowl champion in 2004.
So put aside any hate you may have for the Gators or for Urban Meyer. They deserve to be national champions in football. They are good. They are fun to watch. And they are doing it the right way. Their administrators exercised due diligence during the search for their football coach, when they were looking to bring in someone to reenergize and revitalize their football program.
While at UCLA, not only did the officials take the cheap way out by bringing in a loser like Karl Dorrell, they also took the lazy way out by conducting a sham of a search process, that didn't even bother to bring in a coach like Meyer for an interview, giving us the final 3 of Riley, Robinson, and Dorrell.
Meanwhile, in Westwood we are still left with the cancer that is Karl Dorrell. So, once again, the next time Dan Guerrero or any officials from UCLA related to the athletic department make an appearance in a public event involving the Bruin community shouldn't alums, students, and season ticket holders of UCLA football, ask if there was even an effort made to reach out to Coach Meyer in 2002, and bring him to Westwood for an interview?
GO BRUINS.
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