By Bruce Hooley
FOX Sports Ohio
Wednesday, January 12th, 2011
It's gone so poorly for Michigan's football program lately that it doesn't mind copying off arch-rival Ohio State.
So in comes Brady Hoke as head coach, introduced today in Ann Arbor, on the afternoon Michigan will play OSU in men's basketball.
Not quite 10 years ago, on Jan. 18, 2001, the Buckeyes hired Jim Tressel to take over for the fired John Cooper when Michigan was in town for a Big Ten basketball game.
Tressel took the microphone at halftime and promised fans would be proud of their team, "in the classroom, in the community and, most especially, in 310 days in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on the football field."
Tressel has since won 9-of-10 against the Wolverines, with six straight Big Ten titles and counting.
It's possible Hoke will get the same chance tonight at Crisler Arena, a first opportunity to sell himself as the antidote to three dreadful seasons under the recently-fired Rich Rodriguez.
Hoke is no more sexy a hire than Tressel was a decade ago, but he's the right guy for the time, just as Tressel long ago proved himself to be in Columbus.
Tressel won four national championships at Division IAA Youngstown State in 15 seasons after spending three years at OSU as an assistant under Earle Bruce.
Hoke's record of 47-50 in eight seasons is much more modest, but he inherited disasters at both Ball State and San Diego State after spending eight years as a Michigan assistant from 1995-2002.
Rodriguez was such a spectacular failure Michigan had to go opposite its look-outside-the-program strategy that backfired when hiring him as Lloyd Carr's successor.
Athletic Director David Brandon therefore had three options, neatly stacked in order of preference. Stanford's Jim Harbaugh, LSU's Les Miles and Hoke were the only candidates with coaching or playing credentials at Michigan and a college head-coaching track record.
When Harbaugh opted for the NFL's San Francisco 49ers, Brandon engaged in a delicate game of footsie that will undoubtedly allow him to say today that Hoke is the only person to whom he offered the job.
Miles might have been the choice to thrill some of the old Bo Schembechler factions at Ann Arbor. He played for Bo and coached for Bo, and has often stated his fondness for getting the job his mentor made into one of the most coveted in the sport.
But the timing for Miles to succeed Carr wasn't right following the 2007 season, given that LSU had just won the BCS national championship by throttling Ohio State in the Sugar Bowl.
Then-Michigan AD Bill Martin never offered Miles the job, but did speak to him about who the school should hire. The whispers were that Miles offended some of the old guard during his days as an assistant under Schembechler, and that he raised hackles with some of his recruiting tactics while going head-to-head with Carr.
This time around, Brandon had to at least make it appear Miles was in the mix, when in fact he may not have been the AD's preferred choice.
If so, Miles would have been on the plane back to Michigan with Brandon on Monday night and would have been introduced as the Wolverines' head coach yesterday.
But when Brandon flew home without Miles -- probably telling him he had to clear the hire with university officials -- Brandon forced Miles hand.
LSU undoubtedly wanted an answer from Miles about his future, needing to move quickly toward a successor if he was leaving. Trouble is, Miles couldn't leave if he didn't have a firm offer from Michigan.
Miles obviously had to stick with the job he had, instead of waiting to take a job he might not be offered.
That scenario appears more and more likely given the fashion in which Hoke was hired.
The same airplane in which Brandon flew to Baton Rouge to speak with Miles was dispatched yesterday from Michigan to Orange County, Calif., where Hoke was recruiting. The plane departed around 2 p.m. and wasn't scheduled to land until 6:30 p.m.
Michigan announced Hoke's hiring at approximately 3:45 p.m. Obviously, Brandon's plane wasn't headed west at that hour to meet Hoke for an interview. That meeting had to have taken place previously, with the hiring announced only after Miles took himself out of the running.
The Schembechler faction that wanted Miles now must blame him for pulling out, not Brandon for picking someone else.
Well played, Mr. Brandon.
Now all your new coach must do is win.
Hoke, like Schembechler, is an Ohio native, having graduated from Fairmont East High School near Dayton in 1977. He's said to be an outstanding recruiter, and his expertise as a defensive line coach can't hurt a Michigan defense that was a punch line throughout Rodriguez's tenure.
If Hoke can orchestrate the same sort of turnaround Schembechler did in his first season, he'll instantly unite whatever portion of Michigan's fan base that might not be on board with his hiring.
Skepticism is not necessarily a bad thing. Remember, when Michigan hired Schembechler, the Detroit headlines screamed, "Bo Who?"
Schembechler rallied the players he inherited with the promise, "Those who stay will be champions."
He, and they, made good on that by posting what was then considered among the greatest upsets in college football history with a 24-12 win over defending national champion OSU in the final regular-season game of 1969.
That avenged a 50-14 Michigan loss at OSU the year before.
It's now been 2,608 days since the Wolverines' last win over Ohio State in 2003, the year after Hoke left Ann Arbor to take over Ball State.
He gained the San Diego State job after going 12-2 in Muncie in 2008. The Aztecs' 35-14 win over Navy in the Poinsettia Bowl in December was their first postseason victory in 12 seasons, and their 9-4 record was SDSU's first winning season in more than a decade, done with a squad that went 9-27 the three years prior to his arrival.
At Michigan, Hoke inherits a program that's gone 15-22 in the three previous seasons, with a 37-7 loss to Ohio State and a 52-14 blowout against Mississippi State in the Gator Bowl the two final nails in Rodriguez's coffin.
Twenty of Michigan's 22 starters can return in 2011.
Quarterback Denard Robinson is the headliner on offense, but there are solid backs and receivers to go with him and four starters return up front. Defensively, linemen Mike Martin, Craig Roh and Ryan Van Bergen give Hoke a good base from which to build.
The Wolverines will play their first five games of the Hoke era at the Big House, including a Sept. 24 matchup against San Diego State. Michigan then plays four of five on the road (Northwestern, Michigan State, Iowa, Illinois) before finishing at home against Nebraska and Ohio State.
Iowa, Michigan State, Northwestern and Nebraska are each in Michigan's division of the expanded Big Ten, chasing a berth in the league's first postseason championship game.
Hoke plays three of those four teams on the road. He gets the Cornhuskers on the heels of consecutive tough games away from home, with OSU next on the schedule after Nebraska comes to town.
It's a daunting way to start his tenure, and Hoke is getting a later start than necessary given that Brandon could have hired him six weeks ago.
The early prediction for 2011 is an 8-4 record and a berth in the Outback Bowl.
That would be a solid foundation on which to build for the future.
