Butler Boise St: Why Can't We Play Like That?

by Scipio Tex on May 19, 2011 3:00 PM CDT

Here's my weekly opining at the SB Nation.com mothership. I explored some of these themes a while back, but after Stevens made another championship game run and Petersen's record now stands at 61-5, it's even more relevant today.

The logic - promulgated by a media beguiled by the Great Man Theory of Coaching -- is persuasive: just hire the coach and you get their program. Add the Butler/Boise Way to the superior resources and prestige of a name program, give them elite athletes to coach instead of overachieving scrappers, and the trophy case will be bursting with hardware. It's little wonder that Brad Stevens and Chris Petersen are the two most coveted coaching candidates in collegiate athletics. Except that it hasn't worked. When Boise and Butler lose their sought after head coaches, their teams get better. And the big name programs that take those coaches almost always get worse.

FYI: SB Nation.com is a national site. So keep it clean if you want to see your comments. And no one will understand our inside jokes there.

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FYI: SB Nation.com is a national site. So keep it clean if you want to see your comments. And no one will understand our inside jokes there.

I’m going with “EABOD and DIAF!!!” After all these years, it’s still so fucking clever.

by BrickHorn on May 19, 2011 3:03 PM CDT reply actions

Meh, no one understands the jokes here either.

by cmdr on May 19, 2011 3:22 PM CDT reply actions

You’ve got it backwards. Make their humor come to us!

I suggest simultaneously dropping the brilliant Mack Adams quadrilogy and Clipper Cooper catalogue and watch the entire SBNation lap it up.

by magnusbleuveigner on May 19, 2011 3:37 PM CDT reply actions

This site only appears in Burleson and parts of the Golden Triangle.

by Drew Dunlevie on May 19, 2011 3:46 PM CDT reply actions

I was gonna offer a comment related to the column. I changed mah mind.

by Bob in Houston on May 19, 2011 3:52 PM CDT reply actions

Great work!

by TXinDC on May 19, 2011 4:54 PM CDT reply actions

“I suggest simultaneously dropping the brilliant Mack Adams quadrilogy and Clipper Cooper catalogue and watch the entire SBNation lap it up.”

If he dropped the SOTU’s, his bosses would make him write 120 of them this year.

by Texastough on May 19, 2011 5:27 PM CDT reply actions

I guess Gonzaga fits the profile as well. Both Monson and Few were assistants there before taking over the head job. Monson left for several lackluster years at Minnesota, while Few has continued the success of the program.

I think its a somewhat easier proposition in football since you can really avoid playing anyone tough and you don’t have to deal with a tournament. Butler and Gonzaga have beaten some legit squads in really high stakes games. Boise State has some early season upsets and a few no-stakes bowl wins.

by Ricky on May 19, 2011 5:58 PM CDT reply actions

One correction though Scipio, it has worked before.

It worked exactly as planned for Florida hiring away Urban Meyer from Utah.

2 MNCs later, not only was there team and program success, but after making Alex Smith look like a #1 overall pick, look what he did to Tebow.

by cmdr on May 19, 2011 6:15 PM CDT reply actions

Finkle is Einhorn?
(Scipio is Wadlington)

What used to be a name without a face is now a guy on a fishing trip, at a frat party, at a golf club? I’m likely the last to solve this riddle, but It’s all too much for me to take. I pictured you with a mustache.

by Slugfest on May 19, 2011 6:21 PM CDT reply actions

Does this mean that Harsin has to bring the Boise culture to Austin to be successful? Or does that only apply to head coach changes? I played golf with the father of a current Boise St. O lineman. He definitely had the mantra that they take 2 & 3 star players with a chip on their shoulder and coach them up.

by KilgoreTrout on May 19, 2011 6:40 PM CDT reply actions

coach them up
Up is plausibly the only direction left. HarsinWhite will do this here as soon as our 4*/5* boys can be coaxed away from their u-tube hilites.

by Tex Long on May 19, 2011 11:26 PM CDT reply actions

In a Freudian slip, after seeing the pic of Scipio, I read that he was part of the FakeTan network.

by Lucas Jackson on May 20, 2011 2:48 AM CDT reply actions

FakkeTan, imo.

by Vasherized on May 20, 2011 7:23 AM CDT reply actions

Glad I’m in the Golden Triangle. Nom nom nom is still so clever. Have the boys over at Shaggy Bevo done anything awesome with Paint lately?

by TheStos on May 20, 2011 7:36 AM CDT reply actions

Whatever you imagined ScipioTex to look like in the past is actually what I look like. Just tougher.

by RomaVicta on May 20, 2011 12:08 PM CDT reply actions

One of the things I like about the Harsin hire is our attempt to bring in a system, not a culture. Our current program is already successful and transplanting the latter, as you effectively pointed out, is almost impossible. Of course the result of grafting their system onto our programmatic culture remains to be seen, but the odds are much better than if we had fired Mack and hired Peterson in a hypothetical universe. Dan Hawkin’s fall rivals the Jaime Lannister character arc in reverse, which is by far your best example.

BTW- That pic is exactly what Scipio looks like, except you can’t see the calligraphy Balla neck tattoo.

by Doperbo on May 21, 2011 2:22 PM CDT reply actions

Ricky -

Fair point.

cmdr -

My article wasn’t entitled No Coach Has Ever Been Promoted From A Smaller Program and Had Success Elsewhere. Meyer’s journey is a fairly typical one in the coaching ranks, actually.

Slugfest -

An ironic mustache or a Tom Selleck triumph?

Kilgore -

No, he’s a hired gun brought into bring us schemes beyond the 7th grade level. If he develops within a big college program like Texas as an OC, I suspect his jump to head coaching at that level will be helped considerably.

Lucas -

Nicely done. How dare you deride my dusky complexion.

RomaVicta -

I always picture you peering over the New York Times with reading glasses perched on your nose and a Roman gladius tucked into your barcalounger.

Doperbo -

Exactly.

And my neck tat is the shit.