Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Rich Rodriguez's Kryptonite

Meet South Florida defensive coordinator Wally Burnham. His popularity has soared in coaching circles this offseason.

Why?

West Virginia was 22-4 the past two seasons under Rich Rodriguez, with two of the losses coming against South Florida. The Mountaineers averaged only 16 points, 160 rushing yards and 3.7 yards a carry against the Bulls. They averaged 41.2 points, 311.5 rushing yards and 6.6 yards against everyone else.

With Rodriguez at Michigan, coaches who will be facing the Wolverines' spread offense are reaching out to Burnham, according to Brett McMurphy of the Tampa Tribune.

Ohio State sent cornerbacks coach Taver Johnson to meet with Burnham and secondary coach Troy Douglas this week.

"Johnson said it was because we've done such a good job against that offense," Burnham said. "And we've had some success."

An assistant from Minnesota visited last week and a Colorado assistant will visit next week. The Buffaloes play host to the Mountaineers on Sept. 18.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

And yet his defense was torched in the Sun Bowl by a similar spread attack...

I wouldn't put too much faith in the guy.

Jen Moore said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Hancock.Tom said...

Willy Burnham doesn't have some secret plan against Rodriguez's spread.

Rod's stubborn playcalling lost both those games. Colorado has a rude awakening coming if they think WVU is still going to call the "five plays of doom" over and over now that RRod is gone. Watch the fiesta bowl tape. You'll see I formation and passes over the middle, two things you never saw under RRod