Trying Out DG's Hat

Coaches Hot Seat has been in and around athletic offices across the country and there a few that stand out above the others.  Florida, Ohio State, and Stanford are places where excellence is expected by all of it's athletic coaches, but UCLA is almost another animal entirely.  Walk around   Pauley Pavilion and the UCLA athletic complexes and you are immediately struck by the combination of unabashed optimism by the UCLA athletic employees and athletes, and the big goals that are set by it's leaders.    Dan Guerrero is the AD at UCLA today and his work and the work of his predecessors has created an environment where excellence is expected, and all of the people involved in UCLA athletics from the AD down to the athletic trainers happily embrace those expectations.  In so many ways UCLA athletics embodies the eternal optimism of Ronald Reagan and current California Governor Schwarzenegger, that is very sorely missing from much of America in 2007.  Both of those men have said that all things are possible if you are willing to set high goals, and that is exactly the attitude at   UCLA towards winning championships, and with the 100th NCAA championship recently won it is easy to see that most things are going right in Westwood.

There is one thing that is not going right at UCLA and that is the football program.  There is no reason that UCLA cannot be as good as USC in football, and it is only right that UCLA AD Dan Guerrero demand that the Bruin football program be up to the standards of the rest of the athletic department.  With that being said, the UCLA football program is on a much bigger stage than it's other athletic teams, and a big stage demands a big time football coach.  If you are going to run a team onto the Rose Bowl field for home games, then you need a coach that UCLA fans can look at with pride, and one that opponents will look at with respect and a little bit of fear.  That has been one of the problems in Westwood, in that Karl Dorrell did no more worry Pete Carroll and other Pac-10 coaches than a fly that is buzzing around an elephant.  UCLA needs to hire a football coach that will end a jolt through Heritage Hall on the south side of Los Angeles, and thus we now turn to the 5 Coaches we would Call if we were the AD at UCLA.  (The coaches are listed alphabetically by first name):

UCLA
Brian Kelly - Cincinnati head coach
Bronco Mendenhall - BYU head coach
Chris Peterson - Boise State head coach
Mike Leach - Texas Tech head coach
Rich Rodriguez - West Virginia head coach

UCLA needs a great or very good coach to stand on the sidelines at the Rose Bowl and any of the above 5 men would fit that bill.  Also, all 5 of the above men would send shockwaves through Heritage Hall at USC.  There have been a few other coaches mentioned in press reports out of Los Angeles that would cause lots of belly laughs at USC, and would lead from our point of view to continued malaise in the UCLA football program.  UCLA should keep in mind the words of the great Vince Lombardi when hiring their next head coach, "Coaches who can outline plays on a black board are a dime a dozen. The ones who win get inside their player and motivate."