At the Blue Raiders spring football game last year at halftime, I turned to Wonder Wife and said, “I like the looks of this football team.”
“Now? They’re just standing there getting awards.”
“Look at ‘em. Each player is down on one knee. Every one of them. This tells us someone is in charge down there and there’s no fooling around. This team is disciplined.”
Head Coach Rick Stockstill took over a foundering Blue Raider football program after the ’05 season. The NCAA ranks football teams according to their academics. Among over a hundred Division One teams, the Blue Raiders ranked last.
Stockstill raised the Blues’ ranking from 812 to 958. Impressive. How’d he do it?
“Well first,” athletics media spokesman Mark Owens said, “The players learned they just have to go to class. That’s No. 1. They miss a class and they’re going to be running wind sprints at 6 a.m.”
If Stockstill didn’t do another thing for Blue Raider football, that single improvement in grades is remarkable. Each year an average of 34 players were at or above 3.0.
But his football win/loss record is good and may be about to get really good. His teams are 12-13 in wins and losses. Not bad for a team that has been playing payday opponents like Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas and LSU.
Incredibly, he won the Sun Belt championship his first year and went to the school’s first bowl game.
“Right now,” Owens said, “We have 74 scholarship football players. The NCAA allows 87. We’re 10 short.”
Here you could tell that Owens wasn’t eager to get into the causes of this shortfall. Suffice it to say that the NCAA penalized the school with loss of scholarships for its lackluster academic performance. And maybe, just maybe, a few guys got a look at the new regime, got a taste of the kind of discipline they were handing out and wandered off.
“Things are looking so much better,” Owens says. “This year’s team has only 10 seniors and 47 freshmen and sophomores.” This is good news for Raider fans. Maybe not this year, but down the line.
And down the line Athletic Director Chris Massaro has lined up Maryland as a home game this year. There are still those handsome pay jobs at Kentucky, Louisville and Mississippi State.
Next year, Memphis and Mississippi State will come calling. In ’11 it’ll be Georgia Tech. and in ’13 the Raiders begin a home and home with Vanderbilt.
Things are looking up.
Stockstill’s teams have some interesting stats.
They have been among the least penalized teams in the conference; they own a plus-18 turnover record, and have more sacks than any other Sun Belt team.
Stockstill came aboard from the staff at the University of South Carolina where he won plaudits for recruiting.
The program’s in growth mode. Stockstill is good. Go ahead, be proud.
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