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- Could not have been said better for coaching change
Could not have been said better for coaching change
1 month 2 weeks ago - 1 month 2 weeks ago #482
by wvu4u2
Could not have been said better for coaching change was created by wvu4u2
Former WVU offensive tackle adamant new coach should have ties to the university and state
By Bob Hertzel | For The Times West Virginian 2 hrs ago
Former West Virginia football player Brian Jozwiak, left, and coach Don Nehlen talk before the 17th annual Brian Jozwiak Celebrity Golf Tournament at Green Hills Country Club in this photo from 2014. Jozwiak is adamant the new WVU football coach should have WVU ties.
PHOTO BY DANNY SNYDER
MORGANTOWN — When he was an All-American offensive tackle at West Virginia in the early 1980s, there was nothing subtle about Brian Jozwiak.
What you saw was what you got and what you saw was a goliath of a man who stood 6-feet, 6-inches tall and weighed 290 pounds and had one of college football’s best Mohawk hair cuts.
He hasn’t changed. Except for the haircut.
He came out of Catonsville, Md., to play for West Virginia University and fell in love with the team, the coach, his teammates, the school, the city and the state and doesn’t mind letting you know about it.
And, with WVU now involved in a search for a replacement for Neal Brown, Jozwiak is adamant in wanting the new coach to have strong ties to the state and the school as a major requirement in hiring him.
There are any number of other former Mountaineers players who have similar feelings and stated such on social media, mentioning such names as Anthony Becht, Jahmile Addae, Pat White, Tony Gibson, Jimbo Fisher, Rich Rodriguez and even the recently-retired Nick Saban.
“We have to have someone in there who is a Mountaineer and understands WVU and its geographical location and what it means to the state,” Jozwiak, now 61, said in a Monday phone call. “You can’t be reeling in some guy from Texas or Oklahoma. We have too many great coaches out there who are WVU-tied people. Do you mean to tell me we can’t get one of them in here to build a group of people who are true Mountaineers who really get it.”
Jozwiak made these comments prior to Athletic Director Wren Baker’s media session on Tuesday when Baker made it clear that he appreciated such sentiment among WVU graduates, former players and state residents but that was not high up on his list of qualifications for Neal Brown’s successor.
“I think my job is to find the best candidate for the job,” Baker said. “If they have lived or worked in West Virginia before, great. If they are not the best candidate, that is still the wrong decision. What’s really important here is you hire someone who has the desire and heart to come in and really embrace West Virginia because that is really important here.”
Jozwiak believes after Neal Brown’s six-year run in which he could never create the brand of football that Mountaineers fans and players had created over the years under Don Nehlen, for whom Jozwiak played, and Rich Rodriguez. It was a hard-nosed, hard-hitting style of football that would reside often in the nation’s Top 25, pull off occasional upsets of top ranked teams and created a frenzy in its fan base.
Brown’s teams were winless against Top Ten opponents and never ranked.
“I’m happy (about the coaching change) in one way because I’m sick of mediocrity,” Jozwiak said. “We don’t have any marquee wins; we haven’t knocked anybody off in the last few years where bells and whistles go off. We’re the top of the bottom of the Big 12 and we’re the bottom of the top. So, we’re right there in the middle and it just ain’t good enough.
“In today’s landscape — and granted, there were issues along the way for Neal such as having to build from the bottom with what Dana Holgorsen left and having to deal with COVID. But he was here for six years and had NIL and the portal (to aid rebuilding). We deserve better. We’re a Power Four football program. We’ve got a lot of history. We have a great fan base. We have too much at stake to be mediocre. I just don’t buy it.”
Brown was sub .500 on Big 12 play at 27-29 and just a couple of games over .500 in all games.
Jozwiak noted that WVU’s facilities are worthy of Power 4 status but believes the move to more national — and even international — talent search has been detrimental to the program’s success.
“I get it, Morgantown is Morgantown and West Virginia is West Virginia. You are surrounded by great programs and great football players. You don’t have to be out gathering players from all over the world. We can gather them from five or six different states and have a great football program,” he said.
While that may be outdated thinking in an era when regional football does not fit the definition of a Power 5 program, Jozwiak’s main criticism of what he has seen from WVU football is in the manner that the game has been played.
“We’re just not tough,” Jozwiak said. “You see the quotes, especially from those of us who have played there, and there’s a standard of Mountaineer football that we just haven’t seen. I don’t care what the score is, you better be in a dogfight and you better make us proud.
“When you talk to Darryl Talley (an All-American linebacker who became a star with the Buffalo Bills), he says that when he left the program, he left it into the hands of the ones who came next. It comes from a standard. We’re not going to coddle you. We’re not going to babysit you. There’s a legacy of Mountaineer football. There’s an expectation from the fan base to the alumni base to the football alumni base.”
Jozwiak says that the pool of potential coaches — both head coaches and assistants — is deep with the kind of West Virginia-connected talent to create the football brand WVU has stood for.
“You got a list of great coaches that are out there. Say what you want. Rich Rodriguez was a teammate. I watched Rich Rodriguez do things. Yeah he kind of messed up a little bit in the inner circles here, but that was years ago. At the end of the day, winning takes care of 90% of it,” Jozwiak said.
“Jahmile Addae is out there. I’ve seen Jimbo Fisher’s name out there.”
And there is a segment of the fan base who would like to see Pat White, the quarterback who came to define WVU football under Rodriguez, be considered for the job.
“Like it or not, take a look at what Deion Sanders has done at Colorado,” Jozwiak said. “With the groups we have out there and the alumni we have out there and the alumni reputation we have, why can’t we have that same effect right there in Morgantown? You have the Pat McAfees of the world, the Pat Whites, the Jahmile Addaes, the Anthony Bechts, the David Lockwoods .... the list is long.
“I get it, everything costs money. But you have some juice in the Ike Morrises and Ken Kendricks of the world. And there’s some others in there who are pretty well off,” Jozwiak said. “We don’t have to put a new brand out there. I see WVs everywhere. We’re everywhere. You add that up, put some gas on it and you have a respectable winning program that knocks them off every now and then, that gets in the Top 20, that gets to a bowl that doesn’t put them in debt, all that matters.
“Then everything else comes with it.”
Follow @bhertzel on X
By Bob Hertzel | For The Times West Virginian 2 hrs ago
Former West Virginia football player Brian Jozwiak, left, and coach Don Nehlen talk before the 17th annual Brian Jozwiak Celebrity Golf Tournament at Green Hills Country Club in this photo from 2014. Jozwiak is adamant the new WVU football coach should have WVU ties.
PHOTO BY DANNY SNYDER
MORGANTOWN — When he was an All-American offensive tackle at West Virginia in the early 1980s, there was nothing subtle about Brian Jozwiak.
What you saw was what you got and what you saw was a goliath of a man who stood 6-feet, 6-inches tall and weighed 290 pounds and had one of college football’s best Mohawk hair cuts.
He hasn’t changed. Except for the haircut.
He came out of Catonsville, Md., to play for West Virginia University and fell in love with the team, the coach, his teammates, the school, the city and the state and doesn’t mind letting you know about it.
And, with WVU now involved in a search for a replacement for Neal Brown, Jozwiak is adamant in wanting the new coach to have strong ties to the state and the school as a major requirement in hiring him.
There are any number of other former Mountaineers players who have similar feelings and stated such on social media, mentioning such names as Anthony Becht, Jahmile Addae, Pat White, Tony Gibson, Jimbo Fisher, Rich Rodriguez and even the recently-retired Nick Saban.
“We have to have someone in there who is a Mountaineer and understands WVU and its geographical location and what it means to the state,” Jozwiak, now 61, said in a Monday phone call. “You can’t be reeling in some guy from Texas or Oklahoma. We have too many great coaches out there who are WVU-tied people. Do you mean to tell me we can’t get one of them in here to build a group of people who are true Mountaineers who really get it.”
Jozwiak made these comments prior to Athletic Director Wren Baker’s media session on Tuesday when Baker made it clear that he appreciated such sentiment among WVU graduates, former players and state residents but that was not high up on his list of qualifications for Neal Brown’s successor.
“I think my job is to find the best candidate for the job,” Baker said. “If they have lived or worked in West Virginia before, great. If they are not the best candidate, that is still the wrong decision. What’s really important here is you hire someone who has the desire and heart to come in and really embrace West Virginia because that is really important here.”
Jozwiak believes after Neal Brown’s six-year run in which he could never create the brand of football that Mountaineers fans and players had created over the years under Don Nehlen, for whom Jozwiak played, and Rich Rodriguez. It was a hard-nosed, hard-hitting style of football that would reside often in the nation’s Top 25, pull off occasional upsets of top ranked teams and created a frenzy in its fan base.
Brown’s teams were winless against Top Ten opponents and never ranked.
“I’m happy (about the coaching change) in one way because I’m sick of mediocrity,” Jozwiak said. “We don’t have any marquee wins; we haven’t knocked anybody off in the last few years where bells and whistles go off. We’re the top of the bottom of the Big 12 and we’re the bottom of the top. So, we’re right there in the middle and it just ain’t good enough.
“In today’s landscape — and granted, there were issues along the way for Neal such as having to build from the bottom with what Dana Holgorsen left and having to deal with COVID. But he was here for six years and had NIL and the portal (to aid rebuilding). We deserve better. We’re a Power Four football program. We’ve got a lot of history. We have a great fan base. We have too much at stake to be mediocre. I just don’t buy it.”
Brown was sub .500 on Big 12 play at 27-29 and just a couple of games over .500 in all games.
Jozwiak noted that WVU’s facilities are worthy of Power 4 status but believes the move to more national — and even international — talent search has been detrimental to the program’s success.
“I get it, Morgantown is Morgantown and West Virginia is West Virginia. You are surrounded by great programs and great football players. You don’t have to be out gathering players from all over the world. We can gather them from five or six different states and have a great football program,” he said.
While that may be outdated thinking in an era when regional football does not fit the definition of a Power 5 program, Jozwiak’s main criticism of what he has seen from WVU football is in the manner that the game has been played.
“We’re just not tough,” Jozwiak said. “You see the quotes, especially from those of us who have played there, and there’s a standard of Mountaineer football that we just haven’t seen. I don’t care what the score is, you better be in a dogfight and you better make us proud.
“When you talk to Darryl Talley (an All-American linebacker who became a star with the Buffalo Bills), he says that when he left the program, he left it into the hands of the ones who came next. It comes from a standard. We’re not going to coddle you. We’re not going to babysit you. There’s a legacy of Mountaineer football. There’s an expectation from the fan base to the alumni base to the football alumni base.”
Jozwiak says that the pool of potential coaches — both head coaches and assistants — is deep with the kind of West Virginia-connected talent to create the football brand WVU has stood for.
“You got a list of great coaches that are out there. Say what you want. Rich Rodriguez was a teammate. I watched Rich Rodriguez do things. Yeah he kind of messed up a little bit in the inner circles here, but that was years ago. At the end of the day, winning takes care of 90% of it,” Jozwiak said.
“Jahmile Addae is out there. I’ve seen Jimbo Fisher’s name out there.”
And there is a segment of the fan base who would like to see Pat White, the quarterback who came to define WVU football under Rodriguez, be considered for the job.
“Like it or not, take a look at what Deion Sanders has done at Colorado,” Jozwiak said. “With the groups we have out there and the alumni we have out there and the alumni reputation we have, why can’t we have that same effect right there in Morgantown? You have the Pat McAfees of the world, the Pat Whites, the Jahmile Addaes, the Anthony Bechts, the David Lockwoods .... the list is long.
“I get it, everything costs money. But you have some juice in the Ike Morrises and Ken Kendricks of the world. And there’s some others in there who are pretty well off,” Jozwiak said. “We don’t have to put a new brand out there. I see WVs everywhere. We’re everywhere. You add that up, put some gas on it and you have a respectable winning program that knocks them off every now and then, that gets in the Top 20, that gets to a bowl that doesn’t put them in debt, all that matters.
“Then everything else comes with it.”
Follow @bhertzel on X
Last edit: 1 month 2 weeks ago by wvu4u2.
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