Coz and Brew

Looks like Timmy Brewster has hired Kevin Cosgrove to be his new defensive coordinator. Interesting choice, especially making him co-coordinator with former UW secondary coach Ron Lee. A veteran-newcomer pairing, similar to our Hankwitz-Doeren pairing of a couple years back.

Also interesting because his last stint as a coordinator, with Bill Callahan at Nebraska, was an unmitigated disaster. The way the Cornhuskers were giving up points that last year under Coz, the finals looked like basketball scores, not football. From what I can gather, Gopher fans aren't too excited about the hire, either.

But Coz did a nice job at UW, although his departure and Bret Bielema's arrival was a necessary jumpstart to the defense. Coz is also an ace St. Louis recruiter, which might hurt us there, just as we were starting to re-restablish ourselves there with the likes of Montee Ball.

My guess is he lasts no more than two years in Minneapolis.

Good for Lee, nice to see a minority getting a chance to make a name for himself as a coordinator and audition for head jobs.

Speaking of Randy Wright ...

... the Journal Sentinel had a column a couple weeks ago detailing how former Badger quarterback Randy Wright is the new offensive coordinator at Sturgeon Bay High School, where he'll be working with coach Gary Rabach, father of former Badger Casey. The story of how Wright got hooked up with Rabach is pretty interesting, very coincidental.

Ah, Randy Wright: once a poster boy for Packers quarterback mediocrity, one that we have been able to avoid for the past 16 seasons but may be staring down again. Now a symbol of post-football business success.

Another branch grows on the Badger football coaching tree, although given the circumstances, it doesn't appear this branch will grow much further than Door County. Good luck Randy!

-Also, read the other day that former Badger offensive line coach Bill Callahan, most recently known as the guy who ran Nebraska into the ground, is now the Jets' offensive line coach. Here's guessing he's going to be pretty good in that role, as he was in Madison.

Coaching tree update

Quick update on a couple Badger football coaching tree developments while I was gone:

-Joe Rudolph, who was one of the underrated standouts on the first Alvarez Rose Bowl team, has joined the staff as tight ends coach. He was most recently on Bill Callahan's staff at Nebraska in the same capacity.

-Dan McCarney was named Florida's assistant head coach. That's pretty huge for Mac, a testament to the respect he has amongst coaches that Urban Meyer would give him this title a little more than a year after winning the national title.

Badger coaching tree

Last week, when Purdue was pursuing Paul Chryst to be its next head coach, one thought that crossed my mind was that it would be a blow to the program, but it would extend the Wisconsin coaching tree. Coaching trees are such a strong indicator of a program's success - a strong coaching staff produces strong coaches, which then go build their own strong staffs elsewhere.

Think about the North Carolina basketball coaching tree. Or the Packers' staff under Mike Holmgren, which at times had Steve Mariucci, Jon Gruden, Dick Jauron, and others.

This also applies to former players. If your program is producing players who go on to become coaches, it is an indicator that you have intelligent athletes with leadership skills. That's why I have a soft spot for Tracy Webster, even if he was coaching at Illinois for four years before moving on to Kentucky.

Yesterday I read that Mel Tucker had been named defensive coordinator of the Cleveland Browns. Tucker will always be remembered as the defensive back who made the hit on a Minnesota tight end to secure Barry Alvarez's first road win as Wisconsin coach. After graduating from UW with an ag journalism major, Tucker coached under Nick Saban at Michigan State, then moved on to Miami (Ohio), LSU, and Ohio State before joining Romeo Crennel's staff. Here's hoping Mel gets the Browns' defense in shape and becomes a head coaching candidate.

This all got me thinking about other prominent coaches who played or coached at UW:

-Jay Norvell, just hired today as Oklahoma's co-offensive coordinator. As long as he keeps the Sooners' offense humming, he'll be a head coaching candidate next winter.

-Brad Childress, former UW offensive coordinator, head coach of the Minnesota Vikings.

-Darrell Bevell, former UW quarterback, Chilly's offensive coordinator.

-Jim Hueber, Chilly's offensive line coach. All the UW ties on the Vikings make me slightly nauseous.

-Bill Callahan, former UW offensive line coach, recently fired as Nebraska's coach. Led the Oakland Raiders to the Super Bowl.

-Jay Hayes, defensive line coach for the Cincinnati Bengals.

-Rob Ianello, Notre Dame's recruiting coordinator. As he did in Madison, Rob is tearing it up on the recruiting trail, as the Irish currently have the nation's #1 recruiting class.

-Ron McBride, head coach at Weber State.

-Packers special teams coordinator Mike Stock.

-Mike Cassity is Louisville's defensive coordinator.

-Jeff Horton, St. Louis Rams offensive assistant.

-Brian White, recently fired as Syracuse's offensive coordinator.

-Phil Elmassian, who seems to change jobs every year, was recently let go along with Callahan and is now interested in the defensive coordinator position at Louisiana-Monroe.

-Darrell Wilson, Iowa's outside linebackers and special teams coach.

-And last but not least, Bears coach Lovie Smith. Not kidding - he was a UW assistant in 1987. Perhaps the only coaching positive to come out of the Don Morton era.

That's all the energy I have to research tonight after a tough evening of shoveling in 25 mph winds. Please post a comment if you can think of anyone I'm forgetting here. Will try to tackle a Badger basketball coaching tree in the next couple days.

Bill Callahan Farewell Tour

Jim Austin emailed this to me earlier this week, with the note: "may be blog-worthy is the Badgers match up with the Huskers in a mid-December bowl."

I'm pretty sure mid-December bowls are reserved for the Minnesotas and Northwesterns of the Big Ten, so I'm going to go ahead and post it now.

The situation in Lincoln is interesting. Apparently Cally has made it known he will not resign before the end of the season - Tom Osborne has to be loving that. Funny thing is, when they fired Frank Solich a few years back to guard against "slipping into mediocrity," I could see where they were coming from and sort of agree. But man, has Nebraska fallen.

And consider Callahan's slide: Super Bowl coach with the Raiders in 2002, fired after the next season, and then almost personally responsible for the steep decline in one of college football's most storied programs.

A litlle while back I jokingly broached the subject of Cally and Cosgrove rejoining the UW staff next year. Won't happen, but what if they were to join Brad Childress, Jim Hueber and friends in the Humpty Dome next year? They could turn Tarvaris Jackson into Mike Samuel 2008, or Brooks Bollinger into Brooks Bollinger 1999. They could bring back Brian White to help Adrian Peterson get better. ;)

Of course, this all assumes Chilly is back next year, which my Vikings fan friends would probably cringe at.