Gregg Brandon

So Coach Brandon is coming back to BG as the OC for Wyoming.  Just a couple points on that as we gear up for game day....

First, it is important mostly to the fans.  The Falcons only have a handful of players who played here under Coach Brandon.

Second, I was asked about this by Cowboy Chronicles....here is what I said.

I would say that Coach Brandon left BG on pretty poor terms. While he succeeded early while he had the players Urban Meyer had recruited, once the program started to transition to his players, the teams got worse and worse.

The worst moment came when BG had a small crowd for a 6 pm Friday game on a snowy November night against Buffalo. BG was still alive in the division race in the MAC, and led by 20-something points in the 4th quarter. The Falcons blew the lead, losing in OT.

Brandon stormed into the media room and said the following: "That crowd was pitiful. The fans that showed up, that's awesome because they're the true fans. But our kids deserve much better than that. To be in a game with so much on the line, that disgusts me." My post from that time is here.

Coming as it did from a coach who had blown a 20-point lead in the midst of a very average season (BG finished 1-4 at home that year), it did not sit well with the fan base. BG did something I would never expect them to do, which was buy a coach out, and he was gone.

Once he left, we realized he had two recruiting classes with a high rate of attrition and arrests, and last year was part of the recruiting hole he left behind. For what it is worth, everyone thought he was a really good offensive coordinator. He did a great job calling plays during the Meyer years. He was promoted as a panic move when it looked like Meyer's players would leave if he did not get the job, and he was unable to sustain success in the program as head coach.

Now, Coach Brandon has been interviewed in the local media, and he has been pretty conciliatory...as in this Sentinel article.

“One of the things that I wish I had done when I left was have the opportunity to just tell everybody publicly what a great experience it was to be the head coach at Bowling Green,”

“To have the success that we had there, the bowl games and being in the hunt for MAC championships, getting to the championship game, graduating our players — all the things that I wanted to achieve as a head coach, I got an opportunity to do there,” Brandon said. “Unfortunately it didn’t end as we thought it would, but at the end of the day I don’t have any regrets about the job I did there."

I'm sure he doesn't.  I assume he has not been asked about the recruiting classes that ended up empty, about the Buffalo game, or the weaker records with his own players.  He also didn't win any MAC Championships, though it has been a long time since anyone did.

We did, in fairness, have some very good times under his watch...two great bowl wins, a win @Purdue....I think eventually he lost control of the program, but my thoughts are mostly above.

I do believe that the statement that "he was unable to sustain success in the program as head coach" is supported by the record.

And I truly miss his press conferences, which were the funniest thing ever.