Stop_HammerTime69
Well-known member
To the Bobby defenders, you’re right. You cannot fire a coach after a 13-2 season, even if those 13 wins don’t mean squat next to those 2 losses. It’s a bad look that we wouldn’t be a friendly environment to coaching candidates.
So here’s what needs to happen instead: fire the athletic director. The rot permeates the entire athletic department. You can see it in every single sport that the Griz are generally decent in their conference but are leagues behind the Cats. It wasn’t always this way, but it is now. Mens Basketball, women’s basketball, everything. They are consistent at winning when the games don’t matter, but you put them against the Cats, or any other big game, and the teams just fold. The moment is too big and we piss down out legs.
If that’s the case, fans lose hope. And the business of sports, if anything else, is in the business of selling hope. All the merch, ticket sales, donations - all of that - is because people have hope that if they contribute in some way, their team can achieve the impossible. But if you can’t convincingly sell your fans hope in the team, you’ve lost your market, and the business crumbles.
Haslam has been the AD since 2012. While maybe he’s done admirably given the free falling state of the school, this can clearly be seen as the worst stretch of grizzly athletics in the last 50 years. Haslam made the failed Stitt hire and now the failed Hauck hire. There is no hope for the program under Hauck anymore. It has hit is ceiling. That hope is gone. Similarly, in Men’s basketball, if the Griz make the tournament, I have no hope they’re going to make any noise. None. I like Decuire. I think he’s a boon to the Missoula community. But nobody gives a damn about regular season championships when the team collapses to Eastern Washington or the Cats in the regular season tournament. There’s no reason to believe. I don’t think that’s wholly DeCuire’s fault. Men’s basketball culture on campus is dead, and that’s part of a larger trend of people turning away from college basketball entirely because the game has become a boring slog of defense, fouls, and bricked threes. But to my original point, there’s just no reason to hold faith that, if the team does get the opportunity to do something remarkable, that they will take it. If there’s no reason to believe, fans disengage, and that’s when the real free fall begins. I bring this up because it’s not just in football.
The other side of this as it relates to football is that it sends a clear message that making no adjustments defensively in the last three weeks and coming out that flatfooted against the Cats is not acceptable. It takes away whatever bulwark that lets Hauck be an arrogant prick. You bring in a new AD, and they’re going to want to hire a football coach because that’s the biggest hire they’re going to make in their tenure. It’s a chance to leave a stamp on the school. Further, Hauck’s contract is set to expire on January 31, 2027. It sends a major “put up or shut up” message that the new guy wants someone else in your seat.
Giving Hauck his last year on the contract sends a good message that we’re a patient, rational fanbase, and it has the gives the staff the chance to keep the core of the team together for one last ride.
So the course of action is clear. Get rid of the AD. That sends a message to Hauck to make sweeping changes to the program. New AD should modernize the department under the new House settlement rules.
Then, either the team goes 7-5 and loses to the Cats a 4th time in a row, and you just don’t extend Hauck. OR we all get the chance to eat the best tasting crow we’ve ever had.
Maybe Hauck’s tenure is on its last legs. But the Haslam era of grizzly athletics coincides with one of the worst eras in school history that saw a complete ascendency of our rivals. Someone has to be accountable for this.
So here’s what needs to happen instead: fire the athletic director. The rot permeates the entire athletic department. You can see it in every single sport that the Griz are generally decent in their conference but are leagues behind the Cats. It wasn’t always this way, but it is now. Mens Basketball, women’s basketball, everything. They are consistent at winning when the games don’t matter, but you put them against the Cats, or any other big game, and the teams just fold. The moment is too big and we piss down out legs.
If that’s the case, fans lose hope. And the business of sports, if anything else, is in the business of selling hope. All the merch, ticket sales, donations - all of that - is because people have hope that if they contribute in some way, their team can achieve the impossible. But if you can’t convincingly sell your fans hope in the team, you’ve lost your market, and the business crumbles.
Haslam has been the AD since 2012. While maybe he’s done admirably given the free falling state of the school, this can clearly be seen as the worst stretch of grizzly athletics in the last 50 years. Haslam made the failed Stitt hire and now the failed Hauck hire. There is no hope for the program under Hauck anymore. It has hit is ceiling. That hope is gone. Similarly, in Men’s basketball, if the Griz make the tournament, I have no hope they’re going to make any noise. None. I like Decuire. I think he’s a boon to the Missoula community. But nobody gives a damn about regular season championships when the team collapses to Eastern Washington or the Cats in the regular season tournament. There’s no reason to believe. I don’t think that’s wholly DeCuire’s fault. Men’s basketball culture on campus is dead, and that’s part of a larger trend of people turning away from college basketball entirely because the game has become a boring slog of defense, fouls, and bricked threes. But to my original point, there’s just no reason to hold faith that, if the team does get the opportunity to do something remarkable, that they will take it. If there’s no reason to believe, fans disengage, and that’s when the real free fall begins. I bring this up because it’s not just in football.
The other side of this as it relates to football is that it sends a clear message that making no adjustments defensively in the last three weeks and coming out that flatfooted against the Cats is not acceptable. It takes away whatever bulwark that lets Hauck be an arrogant prick. You bring in a new AD, and they’re going to want to hire a football coach because that’s the biggest hire they’re going to make in their tenure. It’s a chance to leave a stamp on the school. Further, Hauck’s contract is set to expire on January 31, 2027. It sends a major “put up or shut up” message that the new guy wants someone else in your seat.
Giving Hauck his last year on the contract sends a good message that we’re a patient, rational fanbase, and it has the gives the staff the chance to keep the core of the team together for one last ride.
So the course of action is clear. Get rid of the AD. That sends a message to Hauck to make sweeping changes to the program. New AD should modernize the department under the new House settlement rules.
Then, either the team goes 7-5 and loses to the Cats a 4th time in a row, and you just don’t extend Hauck. OR we all get the chance to eat the best tasting crow we’ve ever had.
Maybe Hauck’s tenure is on its last legs. But the Haslam era of grizzly athletics coincides with one of the worst eras in school history that saw a complete ascendency of our rivals. Someone has to be accountable for this.
