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With a flourish of his massive hands and long, muscular arms, Dorial Green-Beckham set the Mizzou faithful to dancin’ and broke the heart of thousands of Arkansas Razorback fans. When the #1 receiver recruit in the nation—and some say #1 overall recruit—donned the Mizzou hat in front of his high school and a national audience on ESPNU, he most likely set Arkansas coach Bobby Petrino’s national championship aspirations back several years as well.

Had Green-Beckham signed with Arkansas—one of his top four school choices—that would have put the Razorbacks on the map recruiting-wise. It would also have served notice to the nation that Bobby Petrino and his staff no longer had to take mostly 2- and 3-star recruits and “coach them up” to compete with the 4- and 5-star recruits of the SEC’s dominant powerhouses, Alabama and LSU.

Success with the #1 recruit would have kicked open the door to greater recruiting success in the future. That would have been a Razorback hat on national television and the ESPN website. Instead, Mizzou got the prize recruit, the prestige that goes with signing someone of that caliber and the free publicity.
Unfortunately for Arkansas, Green-Beckham chose Missouri. The best chance Petrino may ever have with such a high priority and high visibility recruit is gone. The Razorbacks swung for the fences and struck out. How often does this type opportunity come along? Not very. Arkansas has had two great seasons topped off by a Cotton Bowl victory and a #5 ranking in the final polls at the end of this season.

To have to settle for another run-of-the-mill class after so much success doesn’t exactly put Petrino in the upper echelon of the college football recruiting world. It may take years now for the Razorbacks to have another opportunity to sign a class with the prestige and ranking this one would have had with Green-Beckham in the fold. It’s not so much about the one player as it is about the rare opportunity lost.

Now, instead of a 6-6, 220-pound wide-out, they will sign several 6-footers with good speed but who probably won’t dominate games the way Green-Beckham is forecast to do. The other truly big and big-time receiver they sought, Courtney Gardner, opted for Oklahoma because of some academic deficiencies that gave the Sooners an edge over Arkansas. Strike two. They also missed out on a 6-3, 250 pound middle linebacker prospect—Dalton Santos of Van, Texas— who took a last-minute offer from Texas Longhorns. Strike three for the year.

Face it, arguably the top in-state recruit this year—Zac Brooks of Jonesboro—signed with Clemson. Next year’s most likely top recruit—Altee Tenpenny of North Little Rock—has already committed to Alabama (a double whammy). If you can’t win the in-state recruiting war, that doesn’t speak well for your program.

Yes, Arkansas will have a good recruiting class. Maybe even a top 25 class. Yes, Petrino will have a very good season next year, especially with games against Alabama and LSU at home. But competing for the national championship takes great coaching and great players. Let’s take Boise State as an example since they are the poster child for a program that wins with lower ranked recruits. Yes, Boise State wins a lot of games. But who do they play? If they had to take their lower ranked recruits and play Alabama and LSU (Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, etc) every year, very few people think they would be a top-tier team.

Petrino and his staff get the most out of their players. That’s why they were able to put together back-to-back 10-win seasons. But how did the Razorbacks fare against Alabama and LSU this year? No contest. They were dominated by both teams. You have to win both battles, coaching and recruiting, to compete on the national level, especially if you want to compete on that level consistently. So far, Petrino and his staff haven’t proven they can do that. Until they do, they will most likely have to take pride in being one of the top teams of the second tier of the SEC.`

(Sports Network) - Kyle Flood has reportedly agreed to become the permanent head football coach at Rutgers.

Flood agreed to the job hours after Florida International's Mario Cristobal turned Rutgers down, The New York Times reported Monday night.

The paper reported that Flood's acceptance is pending the completion of a contract. The school was expected to announce the move on Tuesday afternoon.

Flood was named interim head coach last Thursday after Greg Schiano resigned to coach the NFL's Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Flood has spent seven seasons on the Rutgers staff, including four as assistant head coach.

Cristobal declined the Rutgers job partly because it was offered too close to national signing day on Wednesday, according to the Times.

Overview-
It was thought before the season that the Rutgers 2011 season would depend on how much the offense improved from a year in which they were last in nearly every offensive category. That actually turned out to not be the case. The Scarlet Knights finished the season on a roll winning 4 of their last 5, including a bowl victory over Iowa State while struggling for much of the year on the offensive side of the football. Many different circumstances contributed to their struggles such as injuries, transfers and inconsistent play, but managed to get a solid 9 wins on the year.

Biggest Surprise- Jawan Jamison, Sophomore Running Back
Coming into the year, all the hype was surrounding stud freshman running back Savon Huggins. While Huggins is sure to have a fantastic career for the Scarlet Knights, Jamison was the main man this season, rushing for over 760 yards and a huge performance in the Pinstripe Bowl. Jamison is more of a scat back type that should be productive in the future as a compliment to Huggins.  

Biggest Disappointment- Savon Huggins, Freshman Running Back
Most thought for sure that Savon Huggins would be one of the top impact freshmen in the nation. He was coming into a perfect situation where there were not a lot of talented backs that he would be competing against; making it almost a sure thing he would take the reins at some point. Well that did not happen. Huggins failed to rush for more than 42 yards in a single game and missed the last 4 games because of injuries.

2012 Outlook-  
Hopefully Savon Huggins comes back fully healthy and ready to go. That should make for a dynamic tandem with him and Jawan Jamison. At QB, both Chas Dodd and Gary Nova return, but will be without top target Mohamed Sanu as he declared early for the NFL Draft. That opens the door for sophomore Brandon Coleman who ended the season on a tear with over half of his total receiving yards coming in the final two games. The 6’6” wideout could make a huge jump next year in production.

Overview-
This was supposed to be an improved offense under new offensive coordinator Kevin Rogers. With his experience coaching quarterbacks in the NFL, it was expected that Rogers would take sophomore QB Chase Rettig to the next level. That did not happen. Rettig lost plenty of his main weapons to injury, and did not have the reliable ground game that was to be counted on. Speaking of the ground game, more injuries decimated this group. Andre Williams was never completely healthy it seemed, and projected starter Montel Harris was lost for the season after only appearing in two games. Just an unlucky season for a team that already had limited amount of depth on the offensive side.

Biggest Surprise- Colin Larmond, Sophomore WR
After not playing a snap in 2010, Larmond came on strong to be the leading receiver for a group that lost starter Ifeanyi Momah to injury after the first week of the season. The junior wideout tailed off a bit towards the end of the year, but was a difference maker for a team that lacked weapons. Larmond finished 2011 with 528 yards and 3 TDs on 34 receptions.

Biggest Disappointment- Montel Harris, Senior RB
The only real plus for Harris was with the 135 yards he put up in only two games he was able to become the all-time leading rusher in BC history. That was, unfortunately, about the only thing that went right for Harris this past season.

2012 Outlook-
It will be up to Rettig and the offensive line to make improvements during the offseason if this team is to progress. We’ll have to wait and see if Coach Spaziani returns as that could affect the type of offensive system the Golden Eagles employ in 2012. It’s hard to imagine they will stray too far away from the pro-style set BC typically run which means RBs Harris, Andre Williams and Rolandan Finch should be nice fantasy options next year.  

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP)—Joe Paterno’s doctors say the former Penn State coach’s condition has become “serious” after he experienced complications from lung cancer in recent days.

The winningest major college football coach of all time, Paterno was diagnosed shortly after Penn State’s Board of Trustees ousted him Nov. 9 in the aftermath of the child sex abuse charges against former assistant Jerry Sandusky. Paterno’s been getting treatment since, and his health problems were worsened when he broke his pelvis—an injury that first cropped up when he was accidentally hit in preseason practice last year.

“Over the last few days Joe Paterno has experienced further health complications,” family spokesman Dan McGinn said in a brief statement Saturday to The Associated Press. “His doctors have now characterized his status as serious.

“His family will have no comment on the situation and asks that their privacy be respected during this difficult time,” he said.

The 85-year-old Paterno has been in the hospital since Jan. 13 for observation for what his family had called minor complications from his cancer treatments. Not long before that, he conducted his only interview since losing his job, with The Washington Post. Paterno was described as frail then and wearing a wig. The second half of the two-day interview was conducted by his bedside.

The final days of Paterno’s Penn State career were easily the toughest in his 61 years with the university and 46 seasons as head football coach.

Sandusky, a longtime defensive coordinator who was on Paterno’s staff in two national title seasons, was arrested Nov. 5 and ultimately charged with sexually abusing a total of 10 boys over 15 years. His arrest sparked outrage not just locally but across the nation and there were widespread calls for Paterno to quit.

Paterno announced late on Nov. 9 that he would retire at the end of the season but just hours later he received a call from board vice chairman John Surma, telling him he had been terminated as coach. By that point, a crowd of students and media were outside the Paterno home. When news spread that Paterno had been dumped, there was rioting in State College.

Police on Saturday night had barricaded off the block where Paterno lives, and a police car was stationed about 50 yards from his home. A light was on in the living room but there was no activity inside. No one was outside, other than reporters and photographers stationed there.

Trustees said this week they pushed Paterno out in part because he failed a moral responsibility to report an allegation made in 2002 against Sandusky to authorities outside the university. They also felt he had challenged their authority and that, as a practical matter, with all the media in town and attention to the Sandusky case, he could no longer run the team.

Paterno testified before the grand jury investigating Sandusky that he had relayed to his bosses an accusation that came from graduate assistant Mike McQueary, who said he saw Sandusky abusing a boy in the showers of the Penn State football building.

Paterno told the Post that he didn’t know how to handle the charge, but a day after McQueary visited him, Paterno spoke to the athletic director and the administrator with oversight over the campus police.

Wick Sollers, Paterno’s lawyer, called the board’s comments this week self-serving and unsupported by the facts. Paterno fully reported what he knew to the people responsible for campus investigations, Sollers said.

“He did what he thought was right with the information he had at the time,” Sollers said.

Sandusky says he is innocent and is out on bail, awaiting trial.

The back and forth between Paterno’s representative and the board reflects a trend in recent weeks, during which Penn State alumni—and especially former players, including Hall of Fame running back Franco Harris—have questioned the trustees’ actions and accused them of failing to give Paterno a chance to defend himself.

Three town halls, in Pittsburgh, suburban Philadelphia and New York City, seemed to do little to calm the situation and dozens of candidates have now expressed interest in running for the board, a volunteer position that typically attracts much less interest.

While everyone involved has said the focus should be on Sandusky’s accusers and their ordeals, the abuse scandal for Paterno put a sour ending on a sterling career. Paterno won 409 games and took the Nittany Lions to 37 bowl games and those two national championships. More than 250 of the players he coached went on to the NFL.

With his thick glasses, rolled up khakis and white socks, Paterno was synonymous with Penn State and was seen in many ways as the archetypal football coach.

 

The college football landscape is rapidly changing, even in the coaching department. When thinking about the all-time great coaches, one school comes to mind for each coach, and one school only. Whether it’s Bobby Bowden (Florida State), Bear Bryant (Alabama), Tom Osborne (Nebraska), or one of the many others, all the great coaches had one school attached to their legacy.

In the current college football worlld, that isn’t necessarily the case. The top coaches that come to mind are Nick Saban, Urban Meyer, Mack Brown, Steve Spurrier, etc.; none of these coaches have stayed at one school for more than 15 years.

It is quite clear that the growing trend is coaches to go from program to program every couple of years. The salaries have become to large to turn down, and college football fans have become too “what have you done for me lately” to allow it.

This article plans on looking at 5 of the younger head coaches who are the most likely to stay at their current school for a long time, and why:

5.  Pat Fitzgerald (Northwestern)

In Fitzgerald’s 6 years at Northwestern, Fitzgerald has gone 40-36. He has slowly started building a program that will consistently be able to win games in the B1G. What makes Coach Fitz a candidate to become a lifelong Wildcat is that he played for the Wildcats and has already been at NW for 10 years, so it would take a major, major offer for him to leave.

4. Mike Gundy (Oklahoma State)

Gundy used to be best known for his "I'm a man" speech, but he has slowly turned his reputation into one of the best program builders in America. Gundy has gone 4-7, 7-6, 7-6, 9-4, 9-4, 11-2, and 12-1 a record of 59-30 over his 6 years. Similar to Fitzgerald, Gundy played at Okie State so he has ties to the area. Another factor that should prevent him from leaving is his hefty $3.75 Million salary.

January 15 marked the last day for college football players who have been out of high school for at least three years to declare their intentions to enter the 2012 NFL Draft.  These players are listed below:

*Denotes third-year sophomore
 

Quarterbacks

·         Robert Griffin III – Baylor (6-2, 220)
·         Andrew Luck – Stanford (6-4, 235)
·         Brock Osweiler – Arizona State (6-8, 240)
·         Darron Thomas – Oregon (6-3, 215)

Running Backs

·         Alvester Alexander – Wyoming (5-11, 208)
·         Edwin Baker – Michigan State (5-9, 210)
·         Mike Ball – Nevada (5-10, 215)
·         Bryce Brown – Kansas State (6-0, 220)*
·         Jewel Hampton – Southern Illinois (5-9, 210)
·         Ronnie Hillman – San Diego State (5-10, 190)*
·         LaMichael James – Oregon (5-9, 195)
·         Lamar Miller – Miami (FL) (5-11, 212)*
·         Bernard Pierce – Temple (6-0, 218)
·         Chris Polk – Washington (5-11, 214)
·         Trent Richardson – Alabama (5-11, 224)
·         Darrell Scott – USF (6-1, 230)
·         Robert Turbin – Utah State (5-10, 216)
·         David Wilson – Virginia Tech (5-10, 201)