Andy & Ari On3 - Remembering Lou Holtz: From Notre Dame to South Carolina to ESPN | Western Michigan HC Lance Taylor joins | WHO is Florida TE Heze Kent?

Episode Date: March 5, 2026

On Wednesday, news broke that legendary college football head coach Lou Holtz passed away at the age of 89. Making multiple stops at William & Mary, NC State, Arkansas, Minnesota, Notre Dame, and South Carolina, Holtz made a lasting impact on the entire college football landscape. Watch here as Andy & Ari remember the college football icon.   (0:00) On Today’s Episode (1:28) Presenting Sponsor (3:11) Intro: Remembering Lou Holtz (13:25) Apologizing to Miami (OH) (22:13) Previewing Lance Taylor (22:53) Western Michigan HC Lance Taylor joins (36:56) Lance Taylor working with Dabo Swinney, Nick Saban, etc (41:04) Lance Taylor’s Rules for life (43:15) Recapping Lance Taylor (45:56) Who is Florida’s new TE Heze Kent? (57:35) Conclusion: Dear Andy & Ari tomorrow!   After Lou Holtz, Andy & Ari send their apologies to the Miami of Ohio basketball team. On Thursday morning, our friend Matt Brown revealed through a FOIA request that the Redhawks tried to schedule multiple non-conference games against power opponents. Will this change the outlook on Miami (OH) ahead of March Madness? Andy & Ari discuss.   Next up, Western Michigan head coach Lance Taylor joins the show. Winning the MAC this past season, Taylor has bigger aspirations than just the MAC. Could the Broncos be the first MAC team in the CFP?   To close, Andy & Ari take a look into Gainesville, where the Florida Gators have started spring practice. One player that has turned heads is tight end Heze Kent. A freshman over 300 pounds, Kent has garnered some attention through the first few days of practice.   Thanks for watching!   Send in your questions for Dear Andy & Ari here: [e-mail] [e-mail]   Our show is also presented by BetMGM!   If you haven’t signed up for BetMGM yet, use bonus code CFB and you will get up to a $1500 First Bet Offer on your first wager with BetMGM! Here’s how it works:   1. Download the BetMGM app and sign-up using bonus code CFB. 2. Deposit at least $10 and place your first wager on any game. 3. You will receive up to $1500 in bonus bets if your bet loses! Just make sure you use bonus code CFB when you sign up!   Make this college football season one for the history books. Make it legendary.   See BetMGM.com for Terms. 21+ only. US promotional offers not available in New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER (Available in the US). Call 877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY). Call 1-800-NEXT-STEP (AZ), 1-800-327-5050 (MA), 1-800-BETS-OFF (IA), 1-800-981-0023 (PR). First Bet Offer for new customers only. Subject to eligibility requirements. Rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in 7 days. In partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel.   Watch our show on YouTube! https://youtu.be/yX2Fi93l_WI   Hosts: Andy Staples, Ari Wasserman Producer: River Bailey   Interested in partnering with the show? Email [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On today's Andy Naurion 3 presented by Bet MGM, we say goodbye to college football legend Lou Holtz, who passed away on Wednesday. Lou Holtz, best known as the head coach at Notre Dame, but also the head coach at Arkansas, at Minnesota, at NC State, and finally at South Carolina. One of the greats. Talk about how he became maybe the first celebrity college coach of my lifetime. Also, we owe Miami, Ohio an apology because the receipts have come out as to who the Red Hawks tried to schedule in basketball in the non-conference. It's a lot of teams.

Plus, there's a potential folk hero rising at Florida. Six foot six-six, three hundred thirteen pound freshman tight end. Could he be a legend? Or is this just another one of those news? guys who we get really excited about. Who knows? That's the fun part. Plus, Western Michigan coach Lance Taylor joins us, former Alabama walk-on. Christian McCaffrey's position coach at Stanford. He led the Broncos to the Mac Championship last year. We'll talk to him about rebuilding that program and about a fairly incredible career at a pretty young age. All on today's Andy and Ari,

on three, presented by BEDMGM. This show is presented by BEDMGM. And there's no better place to be during March matchups than Las Vegas. This year, college basketball fans can win a VIP trip to the Court of Legends event featuring the Cavender Twins. Simply place sports bets and your position on the leaderboard will determine if you win one of the 25 grand prize packages. Just sign into your bed-MGM account, opt into the promotion, and start placing sports bets of at least $10 to climb the leaderboard. Make this March 1 to remember. Join the Court of Legends leaderboard and make it legendary. If you haven't signed up for Bed-MGM yet, don't forget to use code CFB. That CFB is in college football to claim your new player offer worth up to $1,500 off your first wager with Bed-MGM. So come see us on the Court of Legends and make it legendary with BetMGM. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only U.S. promotional offers are not available in New York, Nevada, Ontario, or Puerto Rico. Gambling problem.

Call 1-800 gambler in the U.S. call 8778 Hope N.Y or text Hope N.Y. 4673369 in New York. Call 1-800 next step in Arizona. Call 1-800-3-2-0-0-0-0-0 in Massachusetts. Call 1-800-off in Iowa or 1-8001-9-802 3 in Puerto Rico. First bet offer for new customers only, subject to eligibility requirements, rewards are non-withdrawable bonus bets that expire in seven days in partnership with Kansas Crossing Casino and Hotel. Don't forget, if you haven't signed up for BetMGM yet, use the bonus code CFB and get your $1,500 first bet offer today. Welcome to Annie and Ari on 3 presented by BetMGM. We start today, mourning the passing of a college football legend. Lou Holtz, who I think Ari, most people remember as the head coach at Notre Dame. I think that was obviously my first experience with him. I am basically old, but there are folks older than me who remember him as the Arkansas coach and the NC state coach, and very briefly the New York Jets coach.

But I think it was at Notre Dame that Lou Holtz became a coaching legend, the last coach to lead Notre Dame to a national title. He passed on in Orlando yesterday at age 89. and one of those guys that if you ever got a chance to hear him speak, he had a gift to command a room. You have everyone's attention to get you laughing, to get you thinking, to get you crying. Like you understood why he was so good at motivating large groups of college football players. You know, Andy, I think that, you know, people in our age demographic,

maybe more yours than mine, remember him as a coach. I think a large portion of the world remembers him as a personality. Yeah. The ESPN personality. Like that's the thing. Like if you remember like when Lee Corso retired last year, you know, the reception that he got as like a fixture in the DNA of college football. Like I don't know if Lou Holtz was, you know, at that level in terms of personality. But considering that, you know, he won a national title at one of the premier programs in college football.

football and then also became a major ESPN analyst personality. His late night debates with Mark May are some of the early childhood memories that I have. So a lot of people in my age demographic kind of use when they think of Lou Holtz. They don't necessarily always think of his accomplishments as a coach, but more so, you know, what he was and who he was on television. And I think that there is something there for everybody, which makes his legacy, you know, really important. And, you know, it's a sad day in college football on, on, on,

Wednesday. It's interesting you bring up the show because I watched that show religiously. This was Reese Davis, Lou Holtz, and Mark May. It was the postgame show. And they would, they would come on. So the ESPN primetime game, and this got replaced essentially by Pac-12 after dark. And this show would be Reese Davis would intro the highlights. And then Mark May and Lou Holtz would analyze them. And they had a segment where Reese would come out as a judge. and Mark May and Lou Holtz would debate. And I remember people just, interestingly enough, because Lou Holtz, I think, was more beloved as a coach

if he wasn't your coach. And if he was your coach, maybe there was a little more complicated relationship with it. But people really took sides in the Luholtz, Mark May debates. Like, it was crazy. People were very passionate about which one of those guys was right and which one of those guys was wrong. And I enjoyed the hell out of that show.

I actually got to do radio with Lou Holtz. When I first started at Series XM, I remember there was a Saturday morning pregame show during the season, and I had to fill in for whoever Lou's regular co-host was. And this was pre-Zoom pre-Ned that. So you weren't looking at the person. You're listening through headphones.

And when Lou Holtz's voice comes over the headphones, and we're just talking about the city of Orlando because I grew up there and he retired there. And it was just mind-blowing to me. I'm sitting here talking to Lou Holtz. Because when I was a kid, Lou Holtz was the Notre Dame coach. Like that was as close to college football royalty as it got. And I still cannot see Jacoby Brissette play. So at the time we did this radio show together,

Jacoby Brissette was NC State's quarterback, and we were talking about whoever NC State was playing that day. They might have been playing Clemson that day. And Lou kept calling him Jacoby Brisket. And I cannot watch Jacoby Brissette play a game in the NFL now without saying Jacobi Briscuit. Yeah, you have said that on the show a few times. Yeah, and the good thing, too, Andy,

is that he lived a long, fruitful, beloved life. I mean, 89 years old is a hell of a run, and he impacted a lot of people. I know in my career that Lou Holtz was a mentor and somebody that Urban Meyer looked up to and had a lot of impact on him and so many other people. And of course, if you win a national championship at Notre Dame, you're a legend forever.

So rest in peace to Lou, but it was a really great run, and he had a profound impact on the game. I mean, and like, honestly, Andy, it's not even like ages ago. I mean, he was making comments in the last few years that, you know, ruffled feathers and, you know, people. Ryan, Ryan Day called him out after Ohio State played Notre Dame in 2023.

So, you know, it isn't like this was somebody who had an impact 15, 20 years ago. I mean, he had an impact up until the day that he died. So, you know, and think about too, Andy, you know, people view Notre Dame, but like he coached a lot of different places. all those places put up, you know, William and Mary in Minnesota. They all had tributes to him. And, you know, it's a sad day because he was an icon. Yeah, it's interesting because, again, it got more complicated if he was your coach.

Because at the end of some of those 10 years, there were NCAA investigations or, you know, that sort of thing. But he did make all of those teams better. Like South Carolina is a great example. They were awful when he took over. just awful. And everybody's thinking, okay, what's Lou doing here? He should already be retired. He's had a great career. What's going on? He got him good. Like, I remember them going to outback bowls and winning. And this was a program that I think when Lou Holtz took over had one bull win to its credit in its history. So he wound up handing off a fairly good program to Steve Spurier when he finally did retire. So it's amazing to me how

how effective he was at many different places. Now, one place, he wasn't effective in the NFL, and he was very quick to point that out because he goes to coach the Jets, he resigns from the Jets, and he said, God did not put Lou Holtz on this earth to coach the pros. And so, I don't know if Lou Holtz

would have been great in the NIL area either. I'm not sure how well he would have handled that, but he was the right guy for his era. Yeah, for sure. And I think a lot of times, too, you're the right guy for your era, because that's the era you lived in. Like if Lou Holtz was born

19, you know, 81 and, you know, got into coaching now. Maybe he would have, you know, been adapted more easily to this level and, you know, communicated with people in the same, because like, I still think that the main fabric of success in this industry is relationship building and communication skills. And of course, adaptability. And, you know, he was certainly a chief master at a lot of those things. So, yeah, like I was very sad. There are, you know, I'm not one of these people either that gets all wound up when, you know, celebrities pass away, although frequently there have been a lot of them.

But when it comes to college football and people that I feel like have molded, you know, why I love the sport, I think that Lou Holtz has a pretty large hand and kind of the evolution of how I grew to love it. And, you know, certainly, you know, excelled both in my field and in the coaching field. So, you know, what a wonderful life you lived. Let's take a look at the tribute video Notre Dame put out yesterday. It was really good. People can carry us. People can say negative things. People can doubt you, but you can never doubt yourself. You must always believe the truth are part of something special. And no matter what happens, people can't carry you up, they can't carry you down. No matter what happens, when you have a faith and a belief, I usually just didn't with a fool go together,

But you have faith and believe to find a way. But if I would make a big Ben Shack, the name before it came, and you're going to say really truly, whoa. Isn't anything magic? That's what important. What? How did he do that?

So if you're listening to a podcast for him, that is Lou Holtz talking as he's ripping a newspaper in half, in half, in half again, in half again, in half again, until he has it all crumple in pieces between his two hands and then somehow pulls out a full newspaper. How do you do that? But, you know, perfectly. But there's a reason the guy was in demand on the speaking circuit. Because he could have gone, he could have done the Tommy Tuberville route. and gotten elected somewhere. But he was the guy you'd call in if you wanted to give a speech to your organization or to your company.

So and when he's got tricks like that, I mean, come on. Yeah. You got to hire. I would love to know how we did that. I would too. But we'll just have to settle for perfectly. Ari, we need to call back to yesterday's show and I need to offer an apology.

You know on this show we are wrong frequently and we admit when we're wrong. We were wrong. Well, I was wrong. I don't think you said anything particularly strong. I don't even remember you saying anything that you should be apologizing for. I said that Miami of Ohio should have scheduled a power conference opponent in basketball. And how can you not schedule one power conference opponent? And this is your fault because you have double digit non-conference availability.

And you didn't schedule any power conference teams. Well, they tried. They tried. And our friend Matt Brown at extra points, got the receipts. These are the teams that Miami of Ohio reached out to. He's got e-mail records. He's got records of responses for some of these teams.

These are all the teams that Miami of Ohio reached out to to attempt to play this season in the non-conference. Pittsburgh, Wisconsin, Marquette, USC, Sacred, Heart, Oregon, Michigan State, Ohio State, UCLA, Mississippi State, Boise State, Grand Canyon, Kansas, BYU, Florida, Utah, Illinois, Virginia Tech, Nebraska. So yeah, I'm sorry, Red Hawks. What happened? Who did try?

Well, some of these didn't respond. Some of these did respond, but they couldn't match the dates up. Yeah, shout out to Matt Brown for getting that. so quickly. That's wild. What's the keyword you type in during the FOIA? Well, one, Matt was already on this. So he sent this in a little while ago. Two, this is something Miami of Ohio very much wants to get out there. They want people to know this. They want people to understand this. So I can't, I can't really blame them for responding very quickly to that FOIA request. Let me ask you this. You know, we talk a lot about records and strength of schedule, strength of record, all

these metrics, non-conference games. It has been the theme of our podcast for the most part for the past month or so, maybe even longer. But the question that I have to you is, if a place, and we'll use Miami as the example, but let's also think about football here, attempts to schedule games, or one gets canceled that they had scheduled, that they did not want to cancel, should that be viewed or used or considered at any point during the social, or that's selection process. Intent should matter. Yeah, intent should matter because we talk about it in terms of football and Kurt Signetti has been adamant about scheduling bad non-conference games. Okay? So that's your intent. Like last year when Oregon played Oklahoma State in the non-conference and that was their

one power conference non-conference opponent, we didn't kill them for that because we knew what they were trying to do when they scheduled Oklahoma State when that game was made. Okay. Oklahoma State was good. So you're not going to kill them for that. So in terms of Miami, Ohio, I would want people to know that I tried. It's not that we intentionally had a bad schedule. We tried to have a better one.

And I am curious because this is where I'm going to get a little cynical. If, let's say they had, let's say Pittsburgh is the first one on the list. Let's say Pittsburgh had said, let's play. well, Pittsburgh this year's not very good. They're 1009 in the net writing. They're 100 in Cam Palm. So if they played Pittsburgh and beat them, will we give them any credit for it?

Maybe not, but at least you wouldn't be able to say they didn't play a Power 5 opponent. Right. You could say they made the effort. So me, I like intent. I think intent matters a lot. Do you think that a person in the college football playoff committee room should say

their schedule stinks, they're on the bubble, forget them. They didn't try. Or they did try. It's not their fault. I think they did try make them more likely to rule in their favor.

Yeah, because there are teams too that might be in that position that got games canceled that they didn't want to have canceled. So, yeah, I'm with you on that. And I feel like now that I know that my opinion for Miami

getting in has changed. Well, the thing is, they can still, they win three games next week, it doesn't matter. They win three games next week. They're already in the tournament, though. Should they already be in the tournament when no one else is? I don't know about that. I mean, I still would like to know what the argument.

We kind of need to know what the other bubble teams are at that point. Yeah. And also, do they lose in the quarterfinals of the MAC tournament? Do they lose in the final of the MAC tournament? How did that happen? Who did they lose? Like, all of these things matter. All of these things.

are data points that you use. I mean, the first four feels like this is like what it's made for. See, I disagree with you on that. Like what I don't like that there's a first four. You know how I feel about tournament sizes. And there's a perfect size for every tournament. The perfect size for the basketball is 64. They should go back to 64.

But if you're going to have a first four, like don't put mid-majors in there. Like that's where you put your name brand mediocre teams. Yeah, that makes sense. But they don't do that. They have two sets of name brand mediocre games and two sets of mid-major games. Yeah. My own thing is at least give them a seat at the table, you know, because it's not like they, they whist out. They tried.

It didn't work out. And they're awesome for. Well, the thing is they have a seat at the table. They have an opportunity. All they have to do is win the Mac tournament. They've been the best team in the Mac all year. So they're going to get in if they win the Mac tournament. You like are like your, your.

your standard of getting in as being undefeated when that's not the standard to anybody else. I guess they could lose their regular season finale and not be undefeated. Yeah. You get what I'm saying. Right. Like you get what I'm saying. They could have lost to Western Michigan the other night. They could have lost to Toledo the other night. That could have just been mediocre all year.

Like be having an excellent season. You know, I mean, helps with seating, I guess, to a certain extent. But like how much of a difference is there between the one seat and the four seat and the Mac in terms of path to the title game? Right. But I do want to apologize because I was. And I remember I responded to someone in 20, they couldn't get one power conference opponent. Come on.

They tried. Yeah. They tried. They tried. So I apologize to you, Red Hawks for that one. Did you see, by the way, Bruce Pearl, who's tied into this because of what he said about Miami-M-M-M-M-Aa-Ho, went on Dan Dach's show and basically said,

yes, nepotism that I got Stephen the job. Yeah. I don't know if I would appreciate that. If I'm Stephen, I don't. I do, but we all know that's what it was. And listen, every time an accomplished head coach retires on the eve of the season, it's always to try to get the full-time job for the person who would be the interim. That person doesn't necessarily have to be their son. Sometimes it's somebody else. Or, I don't know, when Bob Stoops retires and hands off to Lue.

Lincoln Riley very close to the season. Maybe that's because if Lincoln Riley had a full off season, he'd go like, oh, Mike Stoops might not be the best defensive coordinator for this team. Yeah. Instead, Mike Stoops got a season and a half. So, yeah. That's. Well, he did retain him after one year or two.

Right. Right. So, but that is how these things were. Right. Let's not forget that. Arizona. I thought he did a phenomenal job at Arizona. when I was there.

He got gronk, right? Yeah. Wow. He had Antoine Kaysen on his team. Remember him? One of the best corners I've ever seen in college football. It didn't really work out for him in the pros, but like Arizona was a pretty good team under his leadership.

People forget that. Wonder what he's doing. Didn't know how. Didn't know we get to Mike Stoops out of this, but glad we did. Yeah. But like it, it did reframe a little bit about how I felt about Miami.

And I'm actually rooting for them. I want them to get in. Yeah. We shall see. I think it would be great if they could just make it easy on everybody and be undefeated going in the insolving tournament. That would be the way to go. So hopefully that's what happens. Indiana, watch your back. We go from one potential Mac champ to the reigning Mac champ in the sport of football. Next on the show, we're going to be joined by Lance Taylor, Western Michigan's head coach, former walk-on at Alabama. who played for the Crimson Tide at the turn of the century,

then has been an assistant at some really interesting places. He was Christian McCaffrey's position coach at Stanford. And last few years, he has been revitalizing the Western Michigan program, took over in a pretty tough spot, but had them winning the Mac last season and hoping to do it again this season. Here is Lance Taylor. We are joined by Lance Taylor, the head coach of the Western Michigan Broncos,

the reigning Mac champions. And Lance, we can start with what you've done the last three years at Western Michigan because you took over a program that needed a little bit of work and you guys put in the work and built to the, you know, got better every single year. Could you tell as that was going, when did you realize, all right, this is now getting to where I want it to be? Yeah, well, first, thanks for having me on. Appreciate you having me on.

You know, I think one of the things that as we've built this over the last three years is we've made improvement and built a later grade foundation each year. And one of the reasons why I took the West of Michigan job was because I felt like, one, had great leadership from our president to our athletic director. There was alignment from the top down. There was great support there. They've had great teams here in the past and a great tradition of being able to recruit great players and also the resources to be successful. And when we came in, knew that it would be a rebuild. But we saw improvements each year and we wanted to build it the right way. And I think really early on in training camp this past season is when we really felt like we could be pretty good.

You know, we started the season, O and three. You know, we played two big 10 teams in North Texas and lost to North Texas in overtime. But even through the losses, you saw flashes of who we could be. We were just still trying to find our identity. And the thing that I appreciated about this team and this group specifically this year was just their belief in buy-in. They never wavered in their confidence and their belief in what we were doing, the belief that we could be special. And that showed up in our fourth game against Toledo. And we won, you know, in the last seconds, it's on a two-point conversion and, you know, took all three phases.

And I think that gave us confidence as we move forward to really become the team that we were. We won 10 out of 11 games to finish the season. I had a special run. Lance, when you guys start 0-3 and 3 and you felt good in the preseason about who you could be, how rough is that that week between week three and week four, game three and game four? And how did you feel like you turned it around? Yeah, well, let me tell you this. O' and 3 never feels good.

You know, I think O'N3, regardless of who you play, regardless of, you know, how you win or lose those games. Oh, and 3 feels like O' and 3. and you know but I just you know the thing that that excited me and encouraged me even though we were 0 and 3 was just the way that we continued to show up and want to work and get get better and that week of prep and practice for the Toledo game it was our best week of preparation I mean guys showed up really on a mission you could tell that they were unwavered unfaced by what we had gone through and I knew if we could just you know turn the tide and find a way to win a game and get a little bit of confidence that we could be pretty dangerous.

Well, and we had Eric Morris on earlier this week. So I'm sure as North Texas' season went on, you were like, okay, maybe that one wasn't so bad. Yeah, I mean, the two games, the two of the three that you lost were against really good teams, too. Yeah, Illinois was top 10, you know, when we played them there, the really good football team. And then North Texas, you know, I told everybody leading up to that game, right, as we started the prep, you know, I felt like North Texas was a really good football team. One, the quarterback was, you know, a really special player, felt like he was probably one of the best in the country. And he proved that the way that he played. And now moving on and, you know, their offense puts in conflict.

And so we knew that was a really good football team. We knew that would be a great test. And again, you know, we had so many transfers last year that we were still trying to find our identity. And I think it took those first three games for us to really find out who we are and what we were made of. and you hate going through those losses, but ultimately it forged who we became through the rest of the season. And again, you know, start 0 and 3 and then, you know, when 10 of our last 11 games was a special run, special season to be able to win Mack Championship,

the fourth in school history, and then go on to win our bowl game. So I'm going to talk about who you kept this offseason in a second, but I was going through your transfer portal list in and out, and I realized what a, cutthroat businesses is Oregon stole your long snapper. They did. They did.

Do you know, like, when he snapped at me? You would bring that up. You know, I mean, I was about to say one of the things that I'm most proud of is in four years going into year four, we've only lost four starters in the transfer portal. And we returned all, you know, offensive and defense starters this past year. We lost one starter, RJ Todd, you know, our long snapper who went to Oregon. And so, you know, retention is so key and critical. I mean, you know, we return, you know, our quarterback, Brock Bowery,

who was, you know, Mac player of the year in our conference. We returned Jalen Buckley, who, you know, was freshman of the year. He's had 2,000-yard seasons. He was, you know, a championship game and bowl game MVP. And so, you know, our guys, you know, had opportunities to go other places and probably make a lot more money, but they decided to come back here. And I think retention is so critical. But it still shows you that culture and relationships still matter.

It's about the people that you surround yourself with. And I think that it shows that our players believe in what we're doing and are bought in. Is the retention part easier in the Red Share era? Because a guy like Brock Lowry, who puts up the numbers that he put up last year, who's the Mac offensive player of the year, that's somebody that everybody is going to be tampering with, calling, saying, okay, you could come here and you can make a little more. how do you begin those conversations and how do you make sure he stays?

Yeah, well, I would say it's tougher in the Repshaer area, a Repshaer era, just because especially as a G6 school, you know, you have success at this level, you know, you're getting, you know, offers from P4 schools that will, you know, triple anything that we could come close to offer them. So again, to me, it was about the relationship. And then as soon as the Mac championship game was over, you know, our staff and myself sat down with each player that we wanted to, you know, retain that we wanted to bring back that were critical to our success and needed back and had

a conversation with them. And then we set up a Zoom with them and their parents and really laid out a plan, you know, one, how we were going to help them grow and develop, why they should stay at Western Michigan and how they could reach their goals not only, you know, personally, but also collectively staying here. And I think, you know, just put together a developmental plan for them and their families to see, to know that we had a plan in place for them, and that they could, you know, reach their goals here at Western Michigan. Lance, what is that if you have players that are excelling or players that are playing really well, obviously that's great for you in the moment.

You're winning games. Your players are getting better. But is there like an existential dread that is just over your head all the time of like, I hope these guys don't get poached? Like, I mean, what's it like doing that every day? feel like that would be incredibly challenging. Yeah, I mean, that's why you don't sleep much at night as a head coach. You know, every social media post or every PFF grade that, you know,

you know, highlights your players and how well they're playing. And, you know, that comes with success. And I think, you know, one of the things that, you know, again, that we've done a great job of is when you build great relationships and we've done a great job, you know, from a growth and development standpoint, not only as players, but also as people, you know, making sure they get their degrees, the holistic approach of helping them grow in all areas of their life. I think that there's some loyalty there, especially when they, when they, you know, believe in what you're doing, they love what you're doing, you're able to win games.

And that's where winning this year and winning the Mac Championship was so huge for us to take that next step in our growth and development as a program. And, you know, for me, it was great winning the Mac Championship. But, you know, we're all zero and zero right now. And so, you know, we have bigger aspirations and goals. We're always going to want to compete for our conference championship. But we want to be, you know, the first, you know, MAC team to represent or represented in the college football playoff. Yeah, and it's interesting because you had those teams, you know, Northern Illinois making the Orange Bowl years ago where the MAC was in the mix for that.

What has to happen for the MAC to get back in the mix for that? Is it you got to win some of those non-conference games at the beginning of the year? Yeah, absolutely. I think for any G6 school, you got to win when you're non-conference games, you know, not all of them, but you have to be competitive and probably go three and one in those games. And then you have to, you know, show dominance, you know, throughout your conference championship run. So when you have a road game at Michigan, how does that drive you in the offseason? Yeah, well, I think a couple of things. I think that's a great, you know, opportunity and test for our team and for our players. You know, we do a great job.

in our recruiting footprint, you know, in our state, not only in Michigan, but a five-hour radius. We have, you know, 85% of our roster or freshman signies are, you know, from the Midwest. And so a lot of those kids grow up, you know, going to games at Michigan or watching Michigan. And so, you know, it's a great opportunity for them to go play in a big-time atmosphere, play a, you know, big-time college football program. And, you know, having won some games last year and, you know, what we were able to do, I think has given our players confidence this offseason that, you know, we can go compete and play with anybody. Because, you know, as we improved each game last year, I thought, you know, we were a completely different team at the end of the year than we were at the beginning of the year and probably one of the hottest teams in the G6 at that point.

So we got to talk about your past because you have quite the resume. And the one that jumps off is you were the Stanford running backs coach in the mid-teens, which means you had Christian McAfry in your room. What is the most amazing thing you ever saw Christian McCaffrey do? Oh, man. How long do we have? You know, there's so many amazing things about Christian, you know, and, you know, I think, you know, I always call him the most interesting man in the world because he has so many talents,

not just on the football field. I mean, he could play piano. He can sing, you know. I mean, all the things, everything that he does, he does that at a really high level. And but I think the thing that, you know, his competitive spirit, you know, I can remember his freshman year, you know, we would all, I would always have the running backs over to, to my house, to my home, we'd do dinner, and then we would play games, you know, ping pong, cornhole, what, PlayStation, whatever it was.

And he, he treated those games like it was the Super Bowl. Like he launched the game of ping pong and it was like he was not going to leave until he won. And that's just that's just who he is. He's maniacal in his approach and how he practices, how he, you know, takes care of his body in the off season, during the season, sleep habits, nutrition habits, all of those things. You know, he's maniacal about his approach. And, you know, I think those things always really, you know, showed out to me. But as a true freshman coming in and not wanting to lose ping pong in the game that

didn't matter. I think we were there until after midnight just showed me how competitive he truly was. So with the piano, like, would he take requests? Oh, yeah. We would be in the team hotel. And if the team hotel had a piano, I mean, it would be like request line. And there would be people coming to watch and record. I mean, it was pretty special. He strictly does 80s, Joel. Lance, I have a play us a song. You're the running back. So you've been obviously a GA at Alabama. You've been in the NFL, spent quite a bit of time at Notre Dame. What is the, I mean, we know that there's a financial gap, you know,

and what they're paying players and all these things, but what is the biggest difference about the level at which you coach right now? And what did you feel like you took from there to help adapt to that level? Yeah, you know, I've been really fortunate to, one, coach, be part of some great programs, you know, Alabama, Stanford, Notre Dame, you know, in the NFL with New York Jets and Carolina Panthers, but also be around some great coaches and some great players. And, you know, I tried to take things from each one, you know, working, you know, being a GA for Coach Saban, you know, working for my Jerry Moore, who's in College Football Hall of Fame at App State, Rex Ryan and Ron Rivera in the NFL, David Shaw at Stanford, Brian Kelly at Notre Dame. And so really fortunate to be on, you know, see the leadership, but, but from different perspective and different personalities. And there's not one way to win. But however you do it, you've got to be yourself and you have to be genuine and you have to be authentic. And I think ultimately that players respect that when you're open and honest and you're up front and you tell them the truth.

They respect you for that. And they appreciate that. I know I always did as a player. And I think, you know, even in the NFL, you know, the big. biggest thing being a position coach in the NFL is, is they want to know that you can help them, you know, get better and improve and reach their goals and dreams. So you are not the first walk on Alabama receiver to become a major college head coach. Davosweeney did a pretty good job with that. But I'm curious because when you walked on in Alabama, Davo was a position coach, a very, very young. What was it really young Davosweeney like as a coach?

He has not changed. That's the beautiful thing about Davo is he is the same person today as he was in 99 when I was a freshman in Alabama. And, you know, I always appreciated that about him. You know, my freshman year, I started out in the running back room. And, you know, we had Sean Alexander and a bunch of guys who played the NFL and none of them, you know, looked like me. And so, you know, I knew that there wasn't really a pathway to get on the field there. And, you know, in those scout team moments, you know, I played slot receiver, played a little bit of everything, whatever they asked me to do. And, and, Dabo grabbed me after practice one day. It was like, you know, you thought about playing receiver. We might need to make a switch in spring ball. And, you know, I always appreciated Davo because, you know, he was a walk on. But he was just genuine. And he cared about you.

In fact, he called me, you know, over Christmas. He still keeps in contact. And he's just, you know, he's genuine. He's authentic. He leads, you know, by example. And I think you see those things in what he's been able to do at Clemson and everywhere he's been. Let me ask you one of you, another of your college teammates. who was younger than you, but when D'Amico Ryan shows up,

do you know that guy's going to be a coach at some point? I didn't know he was going to be a coach, but I knew that he was a leader and he was a dude. I mean, he was an alpha. And, you know, it was interesting because when D'Amico showed up, you know, he came with, you know, recruiting fanfare and he was a highly recruited player. And, you know, everybody kind of knows that when you walk in the door.

But he was, you know, such a great teammate, so humble from day one. And people, you know, guys gravitated. towards him. And just, you know, I've been so proud of him to watch his career and what he's, you know, been able to do. And I think being a coach fits what he did as a player. I mean, you know, guys gravitate to him as a leader as the head coach and they've been able to have a ton of success there with the Texans. How does Nick Saban treat grad assistants? Like he treats everybody else in the building. Anybody can get it any given day, whether you're DA, the coordinator, or, you know.

Did you ever get chewed? Every day. Yeah. So my first year, I started as a recruiting GA, and then I moved to the defense side of the ball, which, you know, was great for my career. I played offense, only new offense. But to be able to go and learn, you know, Nick Saban's defense and be in the DB room with him and Kirby Smart, you know, I was just a sponge.

And so I ran the scout team and you can never be right running the scout team because if the play is, you know, is run well and we have success as a scout team offense, well, he's not happy about that. And then, you know, if we don't have success or we screw the play up, then, you know, it's my fault. So, you know, that's a no-win job right there.

That's funny. I can't have it. Do people just kind of live in fear of it or does everybody just get used to it after a while? Well, I think the thing that you respect is is that everybody, you know, like he coaches the coaches. He is hard and demanding on, on everybody. And that's what I appreciated was I knew one, he was going to be the same person every single day. And he was going to be demanding. And it forces you to grow and be better. And so,

you know, yeah, I think different people's personalities handle that differently, you know, in terms of how you, how you receive that criticism or correction and him demanding a lot out of you. For me, you know, being a young guy, it was great because I knew, you know, he was going to get on to Kirby just like he was going to get on to me. It wasn't that, you know, it was personal. He was going to force me to be better. And, you know, I appreciated that. When you think about all the names, Jeremy Pruitt, Jeremy Pruitt always said,

when you're the D.Bs coach at Alabama, you're not really, you may as well be a GA. Because Nick Saven is the D.B.'s coached Alabama. That's what Kirby always said, you know, he said, Nick coaches, coach is the D.B. I'm the GA. So for me, I was the ball boy. I was. Well, it's turned out pretty well, gone from ballboy to head ball coach of a conference championship team and big expectations this year. Lance, thank you so much.

Andy. Wait, oh, shoot, I forgot. And I even prepped Lance for this. Yeah. Lance, we asked our first time guess this question. What is your rule for life? Yeah, as you sent me, this is a hard one. So I have a saying, don't be scared to be great.

And really it comes down to belief, right? Believing that God made you to be different and making a great impact of people's life and leave the world better than we found. But also to believe in yourself, no matter what the scoreboard says, to trust the process of hard work and building those habits for life that it takes to be successful. And ultimately, that's why I got into coaching because, you know, just like we talked about Davo, you know, the people. outside, you know, the people who had the biggest impact in my life outside of my parents were my coaches. And I want to do that for young men. I want to change their lives on and off the field. I want to graduate champions. I want to be able to, you know, them to win champions, championships on the field, but also to get their degree and be prepared for success and for life

after football to make a great impact, to be a great husband and father and community leader. I thought his rule was going to be never skip arm day. Look at those guns. I know. The shirt small. Sorry, yes. You got to be careful, though, because if you flex too hard, one of those sleeves is going to pop. Just come right off. I mean, how often are we training biceps? Well, yeah, I don't miss arm day. I do miss leg day sometimes.

You know, our new strength director, Andre Bernardi, has helped change our culture so much here. He is unbelievable. He has me training with him every single morning at 5.31 a.m. So it's changed my life. One of my three rules. So I have three rules, Coach. Never complain about free food. Never complain about free beer.

Never skip leg day. So we'll get you on rule number three. I don't skip leg day. Good. Yeah. You can't say that because your players definitely can't. Absolutely. Yeah.

Coach, thank you so much. Thanks, Lance. Thank you guys. That is Lance Taylor for the Western Michigan Broncos. And Ari, yeah, I can imagine being. young guy getting screamed at by Nick Saban, that'll toughen you up. Yeah.

Ready for the profession. You know the show family guy? The greatest sitcom ever made. Aware. Yes. The reason why that show is brilliant is because it makes fun of everybody and everything. Nobody singled out. And that's why it's great.

And I think if you lived in an environment where you were chewed out by somebody, but you didn't feel like you were eight. alienated in that chew out, it held you responsible, but also didn't make you feel bad. I think that that's probably a pretty productive way of growing. You can scream at everybody as long as you scream at everybody. I just feel like if you were an intern or a low level employee of some place and the boss was up your ass all the time. Yeah. But you didn't feel like they were to others.

You would feel like there were something personally wrong with you. But if he is up everyone's and. you know that you deserved your chew out, that keeps you completely motivated. You know he's a good boss and the standard is high. I think that's functional. So, I mean, obviously what Nick Saven did was functional.

It turned to a lot of really good coaches. I've always been to treat everybody the same. Treat everybody fairly. You don't have to treat everybody the same, but treat everybody fairly. And people recognize that. Whether you're chewing them out, whether you're being syrupy sweet,

it doesn't matter. If you're treating everybody fairly, people recognize that. Right. And they respect that. And the thing that I think is interesting about Lance is that he has been around a lot of really influential coaches. And a lot of those coaches have very different coaching styles. So as you try to develop your own, you know, obviously you might lean towards doing what the best coach of all time has done.

But like Davos Sweeney and Nick Saban are very different people, but both have been highly effective. So who you take from, what you take from those people and how you, you know, kind of use that in your own program, I think is always an interesting. like stew of influence. And he's certainly had that. Very much so. David Shaw, Nick Saban, Rex, Ryan. Think about that's quite a list.

Think about the personalities. Not just what they accomplished, but the types of people, all those guys are. Brian Kelly. Yeah, it's a very broad range of personalities there. Yeah, I don't think that Rex Ryan and Brian Kelly have a lot in common.

I know which one I want to drink a beer with. For sure. All right. We have one more thing to talk about today. This is a guy who's blown up on the internet the last few days. One, I love that we've now got spring practice videos floating around. More schools are getting into spring practice. We're going to see more of these as we go.

This is Hesi Kent at Florida. Our man, Zach Albaverdi at Gators Online sent us some videos today. Of the new 6-foot-6, 313-pound freshman tight-in. and Heseket. I'll say it again. Six foot six, 313 pounds. This guy's out here running around.

And the man can move and he's got some soft hands. I'm trying to think about how this is going to work. Mm-hmm. And it could be the most glorious thing we've ever seen. Like, you know what this kind of makes me want to do? And there's no way we could do it right now, but maybe later in the off season or maybe next week.

most out of position body types that were successful in their position group. Jared Lorenzo would be your biggest example. He's the number one. Probably there's no accurate weight on him when he was playing at Kentucky, but people who played with him at Kentucky say he was in the high 200s,

potentially the low 300s, while playing quarterback for Kentucky and played it very, very successfully. I mean, like Darren Sprouls, but like there's a lot of small areas. I just sort of Laquan McGowan when he was at Baylor. He came as a defensive lineman. They ended up moving into tight end.

He was 6'8, over 400 pounds. He was massive. So, yeah, there are these outlier guys. You have that in college. You don't see it in the pros. Like, J.J. Pagis is a good example for this. J.J. Pagis came to Auburn as a quarterback. He was 280 pounds as a quarterback in Mississippi in high school.

And then Auburn ends up moving to the. line. He ends up transferring to Ole Miss. He played defensive tackle. Now, he'd play some Wildcat at times in short yarder situations, but that was pretty much it. And now he's a defensive tackle for the Raiders. I don't know if Hesie Kent's going to be a tight end forever. I don't know if eventually they're like, no, no, no, you're going to, you're big, you're tall, and you move well, you should play offensive tackle. Maybe that's what happens. Yeah. But here's the thing, though, I was thinking. Remember Buster Faulkner, the OC at Florida.

He was at Georgia, coached quarterbacks with, you know, Todd Munkin was the OC, Buster Falkner coached coached the quarterbacks, and Stetson Bennett was there. You know who else was there at the time? Who was an incredible weapon in Georgia's office and not necessarily because of the way he caught the ball?

Remember Darnell Washington? Of course I remember going to Washington. Yeah. Yeah. He's on the Steelers now. Darnel Washington is like 6-7, 6-8, weighed about 275, and was really fast for that.

size. He was such a devastating blocker. He was so tough to deal with as a blocker. He changed what Georgia could do offensively. And you still had to respect his ability to go out and box out whoever was covering him and catch a pass. So if he can't, and I think that it sounds like the plan is you slim him down a little bit. Maybe you get him toward like 290. And then he's a darn out Washington type. And I mean, or what if he's just a defensive end? Like I, I, I, I, I don't know, like, somebody who's faster than you're supposed to be at that position. Right. And that's what, that's what happened to JJ Peggeese, is JJ Peggyz,

switches sides of the ball, becomes a very effective defensive line. But I don't know if speed is always the most important thing when it comes to being an effective tight end. Like, Travis Kelsey isn't fast. Now, he's faster. He's fast enough. He doesn't get, he doesn't get open, though, because he's burning people. He gets open because he's got incredible spatial awareness. Yeah.

I just go back to what Georgia did with Dornau Washington, where you think about that at the time, you know, the game is turning these outside linebackers smaller and smaller because you're dealing with spread out offenses. They're having to have more coverage responsibilities. So these guys who used to be 235 are now 220, when you set a 275 pound tight end at them,

they're dead. You know, because those guys, you're trying to scheme them away from having to get blocked by the 300 pound guards who are pulling, and that sort of thing. But you'd think, okay, when they have to match up against tight end, it's probably a fair fight.

But when Darnell Washington was coming at them, it was never a fair fight. And that's maybe what Florida is looking at here. Maybe that's the hope there. Come up with a mismatch of any type, whether it be in the run game or the past game. I don't know if I think he's going to have a thousand yards in a given year. But if you get him out in open space and, you know,

you make the defensive front align differently to avoid being blocked by him and then all of a sudden he's open. And like, that could be a weapon. You know, you know what this made me think, though, right? The second, two things when I knew this was going to be the last segment of the show. One, incredible opportunity for Roebuck in an NIL deal, right? Oh, yeah, absolutely. Hezzy hoodie, Hez-Kent?

The Hez-Head. Exactly. I believe Hezzy in Hez-E-Kent's name is short for Hez-Cacan. I believe short for Hezekiel. That's a matter. Spell differently and whatever, but it works. And two, What a missed up with our boy, Des Watson.

That's our guy. That's our guy. And it's, okay, this is the greater point I have about the Hezzy Kent thing. Because I don't know what he's going to wind up being in Florida. I love this part of college football where when a completely physical freak of nature shows up, they become a folk hero almost instantly. I love that. Now, sometimes it puts too much pressure on them and then they have to deal with that.

I hope that's not the case here. I hope he winds up having a long and fruitful career. But I love the idea that somebody can become a larger-than-life figure so quickly. And the schools that lean into this, and especially when the guys become good players, it becomes even better for them. Like it helps them in terms of like we talk about real NIL, quote-unquote real NIL. That's how you get real NIL. That's how you build a brand and people want to have you endorse them.

and Florida had Des Watson all those years. Des Watson defensive tackle well over 400 pounds. I think he finishes Florida career at like 460, but he was effective when he was on the field. But they never allowed him to become a folk hero. And I remember, I'll tell you, like trying to interview him earlier in his career when he's playing a little bit, but he's not been there that long.

and I'm thinking this guy's got a great story. This is really interesting. And they basically shielded him from doing stuff because they were mad at him because he wasn't losing weight. And I was like, okay. But that's no excuse to not let the guy be a hero because everybody loves him. Why not let people fall in love with him? He didn't he? He did a lot of schools.

While he was there, didn't he at some point? Did I make this up? It might have been a fumble recovery where he was. He had a fumble recovery against South Carolina. Unbelievable stiff arm. Like natural athleticism out of the ones. Yeah, it was a pretty big return too. Freaked out about it.

And of course. But they would not put him out there and let him get out there in a way that would allow him to become the folk hero that he could have been. And I never understood that. And I'm not just picking on Florida here in the old regime at Florida. Because again, different regime at Florida now. So they might handle this completely different. differently, but the old regime did not handle that.

I don't think as well as they could have. And this is to all you schools out there, when you've got somebody that your fan base might fall in love with them, get them out there and let the fan base fall in love with them. Yeah, I fell in love with them. But like that's exactly we talked about college football every day. I feel like if you say Des Watson, 95% of people don't even know who that is. But he made it into the NFL for a brief.

The diehard college football people. So like our audience, our show audience. Yeah. I would venture to guess that almost all of them know who Desmond Watson was. But handing him the ball off at the goal line. I mean, you saw last year. I think they, didn't they do that in the bowl game? They might have handed it off to him once.

I can't remember. I just remember him carrying the ball on the fumble recovery. The fumble recovery was awesome. I know the person that carried the ball for Bama last year is very famous. His name is just escaping. Caden Proctor. Caden Proctor is going to be a high draft bag. Their left tackle.

Yeah. Yeah. Did you remember how people like freaked out? I think there was even one play last year. Didn't they like throw a screen to him or have him at like. Yeah. Now, Kate Procker's a little bit different story because Caden Proctor could very well be a

first round draft pick. Like that's a little bit different deal. Isn't like a body who's out of shape or not correct in his position. He's just a five star prospect who was from Iowa almost transferred to Iowa. He's just a freak athlete. but it was just funny to think how everybody reacted to him with the ball in his hands last year. Yeah, they did hand off to Des in the Gasparilla bowl

against Tulane. So, but yeah, when you got somebody like that, let him let it be a folk hero. It'll be fun. I don't know what's going to happen with as he can't. We don't know how his career is going to go. He just got there. Works worth tracking.

Absolutely. Six foot six, three hundred thirteen pound tight end. I'll say it. He doesn't look out of shape at all, by the way. He looks like a pretty, just a pretty big body. No, the things we can do with the human body these days are pretty amazing. We were talking about that. You and I were talking about the last time I went to the combine,

and the entire offensive line group walked past me, and there were no fat people, not one. They're not fat. And it's just like the level of athlete we're dealing with now is something that did not exist. Back in a day, you called somebody big. that was calling them fat. But there was a difference between fat and big now. Yeah, exactly.

So we'll see what happens. But I love when you get somebody who's very interested. Because of the NFL, like the NFL will probably make him move or change something about him if he winds up being that good. But in college, you can be something completely weird. You know, I watch all of these car review videos on YouTube when I'm by myself. and I know it's kind of weird, but there is a person on there named Doug DeMiro, and I'm assuming that there are some people

that listen to the show that know exactly what I'm talking about because if you're a car person. And his tagline is always, I'm going to take you into this 1993 Ford Festiva, and I'm going to tell you about all of its quirks and features. And I thought that that was like a very funny way of like, you know, explaining, like, because every car is different. They've got all these quirks and features.

College football has got a lot of quirks. and a lot of speakers. And I wish that we would lean more into the quirks. And we try to do that a pretty good job of that on the show. But like in general, like the reason why college football is so different from the NFL is because it's quirky. Yes. Keep college football quirky. That's the T-shirt.

It's another T-shirt. Ari Wasserman, my white ass, keep college football quirky. We promise we'll make some T-shirts someday eventually. Do you think we will? Like, I know, I mean, I just, I. Payte told me don't do it until your years and years in. Okay. Builds up the demand.

Okay. All right. Tomorrow. Me and Ari Wassum of my white ass will open the mailbag. Your questions answered. We got some great ones. We also have a few great suggestions for jersey patches, for corporate partners, for jersey patches. They've been pouring in, Ari.

We'll talk about it. Tomorrow on Andy Narayan 3. presented by BedmGMG.