I've been thinking about what needs to be done to improve on O'Leary/Friedgen's legacy. The fact is that Chan Gailey is being hired at a great time in our history. We've gone to 5 consecutive bowls and we've averaged 8.4 wins per season. Who have we beaten during this 5 year stretch??:
Well.....
We've beaten UGA 3 years in a row for the first time since Billy Lothridge was our QB. And those were all good UGA teams. We've beaten Clemscam 4 times in a row, which is no easy task, even though they had some bad teams during that stretch. Who can forget knocking them out of the top 5 in '00 up in Death Valley? We've won in Chapel Hill twice (98 and 00) for the first time since WWII. We've beaten UNC 4 years in a row. We've regularly beaten the Wolfpunks (4 out of last 5). We've evened up our rivalry with UVA where the home team always wins. Let's not forget that we beat a really good Syracuse squad.
In the bowl games, we destroyed a good Stanford squad. We beat a good ND team and a slow WVU team.
The thing that's missing?....A Win over FSU. If Gailey wants to really get this thing going, we've got to beat FSU. 2001 was the year to do it and it didn't happen for MANY reasons that have been discussed here.
So, Chan, your charge is to beat FSU without slipping against our other rivals. It won't be easy to do either as some of our rivals are improving (UGa, UNC, Maryland, etc) and FSU will move back up but that's why you're paid the big bucks. We're behind you 100% in moving this program forward.
It needs to happen and it CAN happen. There's no reason we can't be the perennial contender that beats FSU here and there and goes to the BCS.
Well.....
We've beaten UGA 3 years in a row for the first time since Billy Lothridge was our QB. And those were all good UGA teams. We've beaten Clemscam 4 times in a row, which is no easy task, even though they had some bad teams during that stretch. Who can forget knocking them out of the top 5 in '00 up in Death Valley? We've won in Chapel Hill twice (98 and 00) for the first time since WWII. We've beaten UNC 4 years in a row. We've regularly beaten the Wolfpunks (4 out of last 5). We've evened up our rivalry with UVA where the home team always wins. Let's not forget that we beat a really good Syracuse squad.
In the bowl games, we destroyed a good Stanford squad. We beat a good ND team and a slow WVU team.
The thing that's missing?....A Win over FSU. If Gailey wants to really get this thing going, we've got to beat FSU. 2001 was the year to do it and it didn't happen for MANY reasons that have been discussed here.
So, Chan, your charge is to beat FSU without slipping against our other rivals. It won't be easy to do either as some of our rivals are improving (UGa, UNC, Maryland, etc) and FSU will move back up but that's why you're paid the big bucks. We're behind you 100% in moving this program forward.
It needs to happen and it CAN happen. There's no reason we can't be the perennial contender that beats FSU here and there and goes to the BCS.