Could there be a Phoenix rising from ashes at University of Louisiana-Monroe.
Yes, the ULM was 0-10 last season.
But the head coach is Terry Bowden, who resuscitated the University of Akron program that didn’t know a W stood for and who learned coaching at the feet of his father, Florida State whiz-bang coach Bobby Bowden.
And his offensive coordinator is Rich Rodriguez, who has the best career coaching percentage at WVU since 1922 for any coach who was in Morgantown at least 4 years.
And the quarterback is Rhett Rodriguez, who learned Rich’s system when he still was in diapers and who had 1,154 yards of offense in only 11 games at Arizona, where Rich once was the head coach.
ULM has had 9 straight years without a winning season. Nowhere to go but up.
Its days of back-to-back 10-3 followed by 9-3 came at the end of its Division I-AA life. Then ULM got big ideas and moved to 18 non-winning seasons before the 8-5 Sun Belt miracle year in 2012 that began with an upset of #8 Arkansas behind quarterback Kolton Browning’s 3 passing TDs and 1 rushing TD to win the game and led to the first bowl appearance in school history in the Independence Bowl.
As for Terry’s resurrection talents he got Akron off to a 2-0 start in 2018 for the first time in 25 years! And in 2017 got the Zips into a Mid-American Conference title game for the 2nd time in school history and 1st time since 2005. In 2015 he got Akron to its first winning season and bowl appearance in 10 years.
Before Bowden came to Akron the Zips had gone 6 seasons without winning more than 3 games!
It would be foolish to write off Terry and Rich and Brett.
Yes, the ULM was 0-10 last season.
But the head coach is Terry Bowden, who resuscitated the University of Akron program that didn’t know a W stood for and who learned coaching at the feet of his father, Florida State whiz-bang coach Bobby Bowden.
And his offensive coordinator is Rich Rodriguez, who has the best career coaching percentage at WVU since 1922 for any coach who was in Morgantown at least 4 years.
And the quarterback is Rhett Rodriguez, who learned Rich’s system when he still was in diapers and who had 1,154 yards of offense in only 11 games at Arizona, where Rich once was the head coach.
ULM has had 9 straight years without a winning season. Nowhere to go but up.
Its days of back-to-back 10-3 followed by 9-3 came at the end of its Division I-AA life. Then ULM got big ideas and moved to 18 non-winning seasons before the 8-5 Sun Belt miracle year in 2012 that began with an upset of #8 Arkansas behind quarterback Kolton Browning’s 3 passing TDs and 1 rushing TD to win the game and led to the first bowl appearance in school history in the Independence Bowl.
As for Terry’s resurrection talents he got Akron off to a 2-0 start in 2018 for the first time in 25 years! And in 2017 got the Zips into a Mid-American Conference title game for the 2nd time in school history and 1st time since 2005. In 2015 he got Akron to its first winning season and bowl appearance in 10 years.
Before Bowden came to Akron the Zips had gone 6 seasons without winning more than 3 games!
It would be foolish to write off Terry and Rich and Brett.
