Greg Schiano’s Departure A Good Thing For Rutgers

By Leslie Monteiro

Based on fans expressing disappointment about Greg Schiano leaving Rutgers, one would think he was their Bear Bryant during his 11-year tenure as Rutgers head coach.

Don’t count me as one of those folks that will miss Schiano. It’s great that he left to become the new Tampa Bay Buccaneers head coach. It was time for Schiano to move on. If he was coaching in a big-time program, he would have been fired for mediocre results long ago. Being so-so at Rutgers is a high mark for that university. It’s not the standard that a college football program should have, especially when New Jersey taxpayers paid to make the departed Rutgers coach a wealthy man.

Rutgers athletic director Tim Pernetti was never going to fire Schiano, especially after the longtime Rutgers coach played a role in getting his gig.  That should be welcome news for the Rutgers athletic director. Now, he can hire a coach without firing his friend.

Pernetti will say all the right things about his friend moving on, but deep down, he surely relishes the opportunity to make his mark with the program.  His stay as the athletic director will hinge on getting the right head coach, someone who can take Rutgers to the BCS Bowl game.

Pernetti got it right in hiring Mike Rice as the men’s basketball coach. The Scarlet Knights have an outside shot of making the NCAA Tournament, and they have beaten good teams under the second-year head coach. With the right recruits, the basketball program could be a perennial tourney team by next year.

Rutgers is banking on Pernetti to get it right again with the hiring of a football coach. He has done a good job of selling folks about the program, and he does a good job with fundraising. He can get a coach to consider coaching at Rutgers.

Randy Edsall would be a fine choice. Forget about his rough year as the Maryland Terrapins football coach this season. His body of work at Connecticut should convince Pernetti to hire him. This head coach built a good football program at Connecticut, which featured the Huskies playing in the Fiesta Bowl last year. That’s hard to do for a program like Connecticut, and the Rutgers platform would presumably be a better one for making a deal.

Edsall would provide discipline at Rutgers, which is not a bad thing. There has been too many times when the Scarlet Knights would come out flat in games or be unprepared. The players would commit penalties often.

The first-year Maryland coach may want to move on. With boosters and Maryland fans not happy with Edsall, this job opening could convince him to resign rather than being fired, eventually.

Edsall’s ways could bother players at Rutgers if he takes the heading coaching job over there, but he won’t have to worry about losing his job. Fans and boosters don’t get into Rutgers football as much, so he can get away with it.

Edsall is the ideal choices here. Getting an assistant or a retread coach does nothing for Rutgers. This is about getting a coach that can win and recruit now. This is about taking the next step, not staying the same or going backwards.

Schiano did good things here. He was able to get players from New York and New Jersey to stay at home rather than go somewhere. He knew how to get players from Florida based on his experience as an assistant coach for the Hurricanes. He made the program into a decent one.

That said, he failed to take the program to another level. His two signature wins came when Rutgers defeated the undefeated Louisville Cardinals in 2006 and when his program gave South Florida their first loss in 2007. That was not enough. It was time to expect more, especially when the university cut other programs to justify Schiano’s salary, along with his staff.

It’s interesting the Buccaneers wanted to hire him as a NFL head coach. He never struck anyone as a NFL head coach despite him being an assistant to Dave Wannstedt in Chicago.

Schiano was a decent coach at best. He should have his day at Rutgers, but losing him is nothing to be disappointed. This is an opportunity to get a head coach who can do better.

Yesterday was a great day for Schiano. Time will tell if it was a great one for Rutgets football as well.

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Tags: Greg Schiano, Rutgers Scarlet Knights