The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast - Who should be the new USC coach? & Iowa's Kirk Ferentz Joins

Episode Date: September 17, 2021

Joel Klatt explains why USC fired Clay Helton, and gives his top candidates the Trojans should reach out to to replace him. Then he is joined by Iowa Football head coach Kirk Ferentz to talk about his team's big win over in-state rival, Iowa State. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, hey, hey, what's going on, everybody? Welcome into breaking the huddle this week. Lots to get into in college football, obviously. This show, as always, is brought to you by Dr. Pepper. It is the one fans deserve. I am Joel Clatt, tons to get into. Top 10 coming, but not right away. That's going to come later in the show.

Iowa head coach, Kirk Ferrence, he's going to join us later in the show. But first, folks, biggest news of the week, Clay Hilton, out at U.S. Mike Bone, the athletic director, has fired Clay Helton after only two games of this season. Now, this is somewhat of a surprising decision in the timing of it, but I think all of us, at least to some degree, for the last couple of years, knew that this was potentially imminent. Now, what it does do, though, is it puts a lot of focus on their athletic director, Mike Bone. Okay, so Mike Bone makes this decision now for USC, and for Mike Bone, the timing of it looks, a little bit interesting. Well, what are some of the elements that led Mike Bone to make this decision now? I don't think it should be lost on the college football fan base at USC that Oregon

and UCLA had huge wins in this season, right? So there's some sense of urgency around USC and this program to try to get it right and try to make a change now. There's also this other element for Mike Bone that is an acknowledgement of a mistake made last December and maybe the December before that. You see, when you fire a guy two games into the season, what essentially you're doing is indicting yourself. You're saying, I made a mistake. I should have done this previous, but didn't. And now we find ourselves in this situation.

Now, it's not advantageous for a program to change their coach at this point in the season. It's just not. It's tougher to recruit. You can get recruited against. That's one of those. Although some would argue it might help in recruiting and signal a change. But listen, it's not going to be easy. It's also harder in a disciplinary setting to keep your current team engaged.

Keep them going to class, keep them eligible in the era of the one-time transfer to keep them at USC in general. This is a difficult proposition now. That makes it tough to make a change in week two. So why make the change now? Why? Well, it's actually pretty simple. Clay Helton was brilliant at one thing at USC. doing just enough to keep his job. I love Clay Hilton.

He's one of the great men in college football. I wish him and his family well. As a performance aspect of what was going on at USC, it was the bare minimum. And what Mike Bone didn't want was what happened over the course of the last three and four years, which was USC would just fight and scratch to do the bare minimum for Clay Hilton to keep his jobs.

You wanted to avoid that, okay? No eight game winning streak, no close wins against teams that you should beat by two touchdowns. This was a decision that had to be made and he makes it and he moves forward. It does call into question a little bit Mike's decision making in the past. Now, I've known him for a long time. I was actually a player at Colorado when he was the athletic director at Colorado. And one of the things that I can tell you is that his decision making overall at the University of Colorado at least wasn't great. He hired and fired a lot of guys.

And that gets called into question. Is he the right guy to make this decision? decision. Listen, I've had that conversation with several different people. And he fired Gary Barnett, hired Dan Hawkins, didn't work out. Fired Dan Hawkins, hired John Embry at Colorado. That didn't work out. Fired John Embry hired Mike McIntyre. Mike had that one great year at Colorado, but ultimately it didn't work out. Fundraising was an issue at Colorado. So listen, he goes to Cincinnati. He had some success at Cincinnati and hires Luke Fickle. But remember, Luke Fickle was an Ohio guy. That was somewhat of a no-brainer. He played in Ohio, coach in Ohio. and then he's having success in Ohio.

So it's vital right now that Mike Bone gets this right. So what's the philosophy that he should use moving forward now for the hiring of the next coach at USC? This is vital. What is the philosophy that he should use? Well, here's what I would use. First and foremost, I would swing big. Make huge names tell me no.

I'm USC. If you're Mike Bone, you're the athletic director at USC. This is a top three program in the country when it comes to recruiting, tradition, all of that. You are the bluest of the blue bloods. Act like it. Swing big. Force people to tell you no.

That's number one. Number two, recruit, recruit, recruit. They have got to have a guy that can recruit his butt off. Southern California right now has been a breeding ground for other programs around the country to go and find their best players. Bryce Young's at Alabama. DJ Owe Yunga Yon G. J. Stroud and Chris Olave from Southern California at Ohio State.

T. Daniels at Georgia. You can't have that happen. And to a larger extent, out of the Pact 12 footprint, you got kids from Washington going to Ohio State and Spencer Rattlers from Arizona. He goes to Oklahoma. They got to start putting a fence around Southern California and say, do not enter. Because in the early 2000s, guess what guys did not do? They did not come to Southern California and grab the best recruits. So recruit, recruit, recruit. Number three, you got to have a guy with some charisma. This is Los Angeles. The people of Los Angeles do not follow milk toast. They do not love milk toast. You got to have a guy that is comfortable being a star, comfortable with criticism, comfortable with adulation, adulation, excuse me. The charisma is an

important aspect of this because it is Los Angeles. You are an urban school like Miami. You got to have a star in there as a head coach that helps recruiting and so on. Last thing, and this is the one that may be overlooked. I think that you've got to have someone potentially with NFL D.E. NFL DNA. NFL DNA. I'll get to that in just a moment. So where would I start? All right, well, here's where I would start, folks.

The first five names I would call, I would force them to tell me no. That doesn't mean that these guys are going to say yes, but I'm going to at least see if there's a crack in the door. So who are the guys I'm talking about? I'm talking about guys like Lincoln Riley. I'm talking about guys like Ryan Day at Ohio State, Dabo Sweeney at Clemson, Brian Kelly at Notre Dame, Urban Meyer, at Jacksonville. I've got to see if they're at least interested. Now, if they say no, fine, but I got to swing big.

I'm the AD at USC. I've got to swing big. Now, if and probably win all those coaches say no, I'm comfortable where I'm at, here's the next list of guys that are going to fit those philosophical elements that I just talked about. Mario Cristobal head coach at Oregon. Eric Beaneamy, Office of Coordinator for the Kansas City Chiefs.

Jeff Halfley, the head coach at Boston College. Josh McDaniels, the coordinator of the Patriots, Joe Brady, coordinator of the Panthers, Dion Sanders. Now, this is kind of an odd list. Where's Matt Campbell? Where's Luke Fickle? Listen, these guys don't fit what USC is. Okay, let's think about it now.

At USC and to a lesser extent at a place like Miami, who are the types of people that have had success in those urban, star-driven programs? Guys like John Robinson NFL background, Pete Carroll, NFL background. You got guys like Jimmy Johnson, who was obviously an NFL style of coach at Miami, Dennis Erickson, who had that NFL background, Butch Davis, who came from the Cowboys, and then rebuilt Miami. All of these guys had the same elements. They were comfortable being stars. They were comfortable with an NFL style of roster where the players could be more famous than them.

That's that NFL DNA that I'm talking about. Now, Mario Cristobal, best recruiter arguably in college football. Eric B. Enamee, he's from Los Angeles originally. This is a guy that I think is brilliant offensively. I think he should get a look. Jeff Hapley, NFL DNA. He's doing a great job at Boston College. Josh McDaniels, NFL DNA.

Joe Brady, NFL DNA and that national championship as a coordinator at LSU. And Dion Sanders. You're telling me Dion Sanders wouldn't work in Los Angeles? I mean, folks, remember, for a head coach, it's more about the staff than it is about you yourself as far as the football acumen and the schematics of the game, the adjustments within the game. So Dionne Sanders comes in. If he has a great staff, I tell you what, man,

that could be something as interesting as we have seen in college football in a long, long time. So there's my thoughts on the USC situation. I think Mike Bone is under an immense amount of pressure to get this right. He's got to get it right. He's got to swing big. He's got to find somebody that can recruit. He's got to find someone with charisma. And ultimately, I think some NFL DNA would ultimately help.

next coach at USC. Let's get into the top 10 teams in the country as I see them after we reflected on that news from USC. But first before the top 10, here are the teams that just didn't quite make it for me. Here's my almost in the top 10, Wisconsin. They bounced back after that loss to Penn State. UCLA, obviously, even in a buy week. Ole Miss, but watch out for Ole Miss. Florida dropped down a little bit. I don't think they've looked great. Notre Dame again, they dropped out of the top 10 even though that they're 2 and 0 just because hasn't been quite what we expected from Notre Dame. So here are the top 10 teams in the country as I see them. Texas A&M, they actually fell down. They beat my buffs. Wasn't all that impressive. Penn State, they're starting to creep up for me.

Ohio State goes down to eight. Iowa. I tell you what, a couple of ranked wins right there. Cincinnati has looked dominant. Clemson is right there. Oregon all the way up into the top five. There's OU. There's Georgia and, of course, Alabama. Those top two are going to stay there for a while this and then we'll see what happens down the stretch. But really this whole top 10 is about one major shakeup. And it was the result in Columbus, Oregon going in and beating Ohio State. So you see I've got Ohio State down to eight. Some have let them fall a little bit further,

but they're going to be at eight for me. This game was really about Oregon's ability to come in and win the trenches and then also beat them with schematics. I thought that the Ohio State defense was really, really poor. And this all can't be just a big blame game on the coaching staff for Kerry Combs, the defensive coordinator. The players have got to accept some of this responsibility. And I'm going to show you on film exactly the type of play that was going on in the shoe on Saturday. This is one of the touchdowns. They're in man coverage.

Ohio State is, okay? The linebackers are going to what's called Banjo, the running back. If he goes right, one takes him. If he goes left, the other takes him. Oregon's going to read the defensive end on this little stretch zone read play. So here's the read from Brown, the quarterback. They pull a guard out. He doesn't even have to block the defensive end

because the end's not being aggressive. He just squeezes down. And then they're going to crack back on that man player, the linebacker. The corner has got to fall off this. He's got to crack, replace, and become the support player. The safety's eyes are in the backfield. He takes no path towards the running back. And Verdell runs out there totally untouched.

The guard didn't even have to block anybody. That is just terrible defense. All right. That play is designed to work from a defensive standpoint. That's just not the coordinator's job. That's terrible execution from the players. Here are a very similar style of play. The differences are going to motion in and then actually crack this defensive end.

You're going to get the same nasty split from the wide receiver. He's going to go in and he's going to block these man players and try to get this sweep on the outside. Watch this one block. Three Buckeyes get blocked by one player and it's the same thing. The corner, the DB doesn't crack, replace. There's no edge player. There's no support. The safety takes a support.

poor angle. That's atrocious execution from the Ohio State Buckeyes on defense. Look at this play later in the game. It's the exact same style of concept. No read now. They're just going to hand the ball off. He's going to crack on the linebacker right there. No one fills over the top. Where's the defensive back? Like, and if you can't do this and if you can't play man coverage and you've got to get out of man coverage, here's another display of man coverage gone wrong. The tight end's going to motion over. He's the man player in the middle. He's going to go them. Now, what happened? How does this hole become so big? Well, this player right here, he's responsible for the B gap. Then he takes the outside angle. That's a missed assignment from

the linebacker. There's a huge hole in the middle of the field. And again, the common theme, a defensive back, a safety takes a poor angle and doesn't make the tackle. Listen, these schemes are designed to work if the players are in the right spot. Is their outside arm free? Do they set an edge? Are they in the right gap? And none of them were. So as much as Kerry Combs is coming under fire and maybe rightly so for not adjusting in that man coverage. The players have got to accept some of this responsibility. Ryan Day has said there's going to be some changes coming on defense. I expect some of that to be personnel driven, the guys that are on the field. I expect that to be maybe staff

related and who's calling the defense. And then we'll see where they go from there from the scheme perspective. One thing that I would do with Ohio State, they've got young secondary players with a lot a length. All these corners and safeties are six foot, six one. Ryan Watts is six three. Put them in zone coverage. What does zone coverage allow you to do? Put your eyes in the back field. Recognize what's going on on the football field and reacting and making the play. It's one of the things that makes Iowa's defense so successful is that they've got eyes in the backfield. It allows them to create turnovers. It creates levels of the defense. It's hard to get big plays against Iowa because you've got to go through their defensive line, then their

linebackers, then they're secondary. They're not out of position. When you run man coverage like Ohio State, there's no levels of defense. So one crease, one player gets out of his gap, and boom, it's a big play. Those big plays came back to haunt Ohio State. They couldn't recover from it from their offensive perspective and just outscore Oregon and they lose at home. Credit to Oregon. They found the mismatches. They found the weaknesses in that defense and then they exploited them. Cudos to Mario Cristobal on those ducks. That is a heck of a win. And now the Pac-12 sitting pretty with a potential playoff berth with either UCLA, Oregon, you never know. Coming up, the coach of the team I just mentioned the Iowa Hawkeyes. Kirk Ferrence joins us on breaking the huddle after a huge win over in-state rival Iowa State.

Time now to be joined by the Iowa head coach, Kirk Ferrence, who's been, I guess now you're like the elder statesman of college football coach. You've been at Iowa forever. You guys are doing an amazing job. A couple of ranked wins, only team in the country that can say that. You beat Indiana and then the in-state rivalry. And I know it's an emotional game. Trust me, I get it, especially being on the road, beating your rival Iowa State. What a great start for you guys. Yeah, we're really pleased with that part of it.

And to your point about the Iowa State game, it's always a big game, always has been for everybody in our state. It's great for our state first and foremost. But, you know, it's really an emotional contest for everybody involved. and it's usually a really tough game and Saturday was no exception. Now, you guys have faced a couple of offenses that a lot of us thought were going to be very potent coming into the season.

Indiana with Michael Pennitz at quarterback, obviously Brock Purdy and Breece Hall for Iowa State. And you guys have held these quarterbacks totally in check under 50% completion percentage, six interceptions, no touchdowns. What are you guys doing defensively right now that is working out so well? I think, you know, probably the end of the end.

is playing great team defense. And that's really what we've done when we've been playing defense well throughout the years. And it really started Norm Parker years ago. And then Phil's done a great job taking over this past decade. But it gets not just a great team defense. We have tremendous respect for both opponents for obvious reasons, veteran quarterbacks that were accomplished. You mentioned, you know, the running back at Iowa State, got an outstanding tight end as well, good receivers. And then the receiver at Indiana is as good you're going to face. So. really proud of the way the guys responded to that. And then our biggest concern really was up front on the defensive line. I think those guys have done a good job. They've grown a lot in two weeks. And I'm excited about both sides of the ball on the line of scrimmage because I think we have a lot of opportunity for growth. You've talked about growth and needing to get better.

And listen, every coach is in that mold. And this is what's beautiful about college football is it's about development from the first couple of games to what you can be trying to play your best when you get into the month of November, right? That's what this sport is all about. So where are the areas, coach, that you would like to see improvement from your hot guys?

Yeah, first of all, you're exactly right about that. And it's especially true here. And I don't know a lot about a lot of things, but I've been 30 years at this institution, I guess 30 plus. And historically, you know, that's usually, September is usually a challenging month for us. And our best teams have really improved

in the months of October and November based on, you know, trying to get a foundation, built in September. So we're really looking at that. And then is that, you know, transfers to our team. I mentioned both sides of the ball. We're young up front. One of our veterans, Kyleers shot, offensive guard, injured his foot right at the end of July. So he's been out until this week. So that made us younger. Tarra Linderbom is obviously an experienced player. And then we've got Zach Van Bulkenberg on defense. So it was the only two really returning veterans that we had. So, you know, to watch those guys grow play and they're going to learn from the experiences. We've had two

two tough challenging games. And these next couple weeks are really important to. Hopefully we'll see more growth and development, more cohesion on the offensive side. And I think once we get that, then our skill players are going to be able to probably perform a little bit better. So that's probably number one where our focus is at this point. Coach, I know I know every team is its own entity, right? And every year is its own entity.

However, you built a ton of momentum late last year. You lose your first two last year and then you you rip off six victories. and now you've rolled that into this year. How good was your offseason based on the fact that you finished with such great momentum? Yeah, that's a, you know, it's a two-partner. I guess, you know, it's always good to have momentum. There's nothing wrong with that. But it doesn't necessarily carry over when you get going in January because you do have a new team in college football.

You always lose good players if you've had a good team. And, you know, you got a lot of newcomers joining you. So nothing's automatic. I think the one carryover, the biggest one, Joel, has just been our leadership. The guys that are experienced in our program, They've done a really good job of modeling the right behaviors. You know, they've practiced well, they've trained well. They do things away from the building really well, and they've set a good example for our younger guys.

And we're at the point right now where we need more younger guys to, you know, keep pace with those guys or at least, you know, join that group. And I think the faster that happens, the better our team will become. But that is definitely one carryover. We've got a lot of good veteran players that truly do understand, you know, what it is to work, how you have to go about it, get out on the field the importance of ball security, the importance of coming up with takeaways when those opportunities present themselves. Those guys understand that and value that. Well, you guys have gotten plenty of takeaways and big ones, too, even putting the ball in the end zone on that defensive side. Coach, loved watching you so far. Can't wait to potentially get

to Kinnick. Trust me, you got you guys are in our radar here. I think Gus Ginny and I will be headed to Kinnick sometime in October and we can't wait to see you then. It's like anything else. You got to earn it. We understand that and hopefully we'll see it. All right, see you, bud. Have a good day. What a jam packed show, but we couldn't get out of here without a little bit of social media stuff, right? How about a little clat back? Let's see what we got on the old Twitter sphere out there. Okay. Corey Mack says, why would the top five leave their schools to move laterally to SC?

Usually agree with you, Joel, but this take is lazy, good use of the emoji. This is in response to me saying that, hey, the first five people I would call if I was the athletic director at USC. were those who's who of college football, the Lincoln Riley, Ryan Day, Urban Meyer, Dabo Sweeney, Brian Kelly. And listen, it's not about the fact that I think they would move. It's that on the 1% or half percent chance

that they would entertain it, if I'm the athletic director, it's my job to at least cover those bases, cast the widest net as possible. So I'm not saying that those guys are going to be the next coach at Southern California at USC. My issue is that if I'm the AD, I'm making the call.

Why wouldn't you make the call? You got to make the call. Why? Because you're the USC athletic director. Act like it. Hey, thanks for joining us today here on Breaking the Hottle. It's been a huge show, a big show, lots that we got into. You can give me some feedback at Joel Clad on Twitter.

Remember to follow us at CFB on Fox on Twitter as well. This show, as always, is brought to you by Dr. Pepper. We appreciate their support. It is the one fans deserve. Thanks for watching, everybody. Tune in next week.