After watching Todd Reesing, the offensive line, the wide receivers, the play-callers, Mark Mangino and anyone else who had a hand in Saturday’s third straight and probably most debilitating loss of the season, a question that has been burning inside me can smolder no more.
Is it time to put an end to the Mark Mangino era?
Wow. Really? Three straight losses and suddenly it’s time to fire the man who made KU a relevant team in the Big 12, won a BCS Bowl and put KU in contention for a Big 12 North title when prior to his arrival, KU football couldn’t sniff the top-tier teams in the North? Fire the guy?
Yes. And to say that hurts, but the crux of whether or not you fire Mangino comes down to one question and that’s a question that only Lew Perkins can answer – Do you want to be a big time football school, Yes or No.
If the answer is yes, then you get rid of Mark Mangino at the end of this season and you go grab a coach who has won and recruited at a high level. If you want to compete for a National Championship in football, which I truly believe Lew Perkins does, then you get somebody else to get you there because Mark Mangino isn’t going to do it. And that’s meant with no disrespect to the big man, because Mangino has done an incredible job in turning this program around, and KU might not be in this position, where people are upset with a 5-3 start and 1-3 conference record. 10 years ago, no one cared and losses like these last three were par for the course.
But the Big Man has upped the ante. He’s made KU relevant for the first time in a long time and the last three years of the Mangino era have been as good as any three year stretch in KU Football history. Heck, KU even has a few four-star recruits to call its own now, and they had a quarterback that was looking sorta Heisman-ish in Todd Reesing before he went all Adam Barman/Brian Luke on us the last three weeks.
Yeah, the pressure was finally put on a KU football team to perform like an elite football program, a program with upgraded facilities, a program that was expected to compete for a Big 12 Championship, a program that has planned to add luxury boxes in the form of the new $34 Million Gridiron Club, for donors with deep pockets on the opposite side of the stadium of the press box. Why, The Lew even reached out to the most visible name in KU Football history, Gale Sayers, the Kansas Comet, to shill on behalf of the University and bring in more money to what is allegedly becoming a major football program.
But here’s the problem, KU is proving this year that it’s not ready for the primetime and in a year when you have the best duo of wide receivers in the country, a good running game, a decent offensive line, and a marginal defense, you should be better than 5-3 and 1-3 in a very weak Big 12.
That kind of performance gets you fired at Auburn. Ask Tommy Tuberville. Oh, and he had an undefeated season on his resume, not to mention an 85-40 career record as well as a 6-3 career bowl record. Now, KU is no Auburn, and I understand that, but again, I go back to the question for The Lew – Are you trying to be an elite football program or not?
Yeah, I know injuries and inexperience have cost the Jayhawks, but guess what, it’s football, and injuries plague everybody. “We’d be better right now if Todd Reesing wasn’t hurt,” some of you are screaming. Cincinnati, a program very much like KU’s, lost its starting quarterback Tony Pike and what did the backup do? Threw four touchdown passes in a win.
Is Kale Pick ready to do that? Doubt it.
See, right now, KU’s football program is a lot like TJ Maxx and Famous Footwear. Sure, I can get nice, designer clothes at TJ Maxx or a decent pair of Nikes at Famous Footwear. But chances are, the shirt I really want at TJ Maxx has one sleeve longer than the other or there’s a tiny hole under the pocket that you know nobody can see, but you know it’s still there. And yeah, those all-white Nikes that look clean when you’re going out to the club are at Famous Footwear, but those Jordans that guy was wearing at the club who left with the girl you bought the drink for? He got those at Finish Line. KU’s program has little holes in it, like slow linebackers, no impact defenders, no depth at running back.
Elite programs? They don’t shop at TJ Maxx and Famous Footwear. They’re at Nieman Marcus and Champs. Ask Bill Self, he’ll tell you.
I love Mark Mangino, and I wrote after the 2005 season that if there was anybody that could bring the KU program back, it was Mark Mangino. And guess what, he did. But I don’t think he can take it any further.
So if not Mangino, then who? And as a good friend of mine suggested, he wasn’t sure that anyone can take the KU program any further. KU can go further, and guys like the aforementioned Tommy Tuberville, a Terry Bowden, Chris Peterson from Boise State, although I worry about Peterson now after watching Dan Hawkins fail so miserably at Colorado, maybe a Gary Patterson from TCU. Those are just some of the guys who could come in and take this program to the next level.
And some will argue if what KU fans are seeing now is as good as it gets for KU football. A good team, somewhere between six and nine wins, an average bowl and then one year out of ten you might sneak up on somebody. You think that’s what The Lew wants? You think he’s adding a $34 Million expansion to the stadium to be an average football team that makes it to an average bowl every year?
No way. The Lew wants a National Championship in football, because as an athletic director, he’s done everything else. He’s won championships at UConn and KU in basketball, he brought Division I football to UConn and made them respectable, and he’s given Mark Mangino everything he’s needed to win. Problem is, Mangino won a BCS Bowl that Perkins arranged, but unless there’s a miracle these next four games, and I’m not expecting one, the Big 12 North title that seemed like KU’s to lose? That could very well end up in the hands of Bill Snyder and K-State.
Ouch.
And don’t forget, Mangino needed Todd Reesing to save his job four years ago when KU was imploding similarly to how it is now, having lost four in a row before he removed Reesing’s redshirt at halftime of the Colorado game, and Reesing sparked KU to a 20-15 win and restoring the season and saving Mangino’s job. Call me crazy, but I don’t see Kale Pick doing the same thing this year.
I love Mangino, but the question remains the same – Is KU going Big Time or Not?
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