Congrats to former Michigan Defensive Coordinator Ron English. He is going to be named as the new head coach at Eastern Michigan at 1PM EST today. This hiring does not come a surprise, as Lloyd Carr was part of the EMU coach search committee. English will be the fifth African-American coach in Division I college football.The head football coach job at Eastern is a tough gig. It is primarily a commuter school. Very low student involvement. They operate in the shadow of the Michigan campus. They compete with successful in-state MAC programs at Central and Western Michigan. Their last bowl game was in the 1987 California Bowl.
Despite all the downside, Eastern is a head coach opportunity. I would really like to see Ron English do well in Ypsi. From my observations, he is a good man and a solid football coach. I will root for them all year long except when they come to Ann Arbor in September.
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I hear he is a pretty good recruiter, so maybe that might help Eastern get some talent although they've had some pretty good talent on the offensive side of the ball. It's the defensive side that needs the work. I went to a game at Rynearson for the first time in about 15 years this year and it was pretty sad that the Cal Bowl was the biggest thing to put up.
Agree, English is great people.
Some of the former graduate assistant coaches at Michigan ended up at Eastern. Hopefully he will keep them on.
English would have been better going at the Toledo job instead of the EMU HURON position, but that is just my humble opinion.
I agree with Andy, EMU is basically a commuter school that has very marginal (if not apathatic) school spirit among its students and alumni.
EMU reminds me a lot of Akron U then. They don't have any kind of large following because everyone that goes there lives at home or just outside the city. They're building a nice brand new stadium in downtown Akron that they expect to be packed and I really just don't see it. All it's going to do is make it cost 35 dollars to go see a football game and a big pain in the ass to park.
I don't disagree that EMU is basically a commuter school but as the Lions demonstrate, put a good product on the field and people will come. The Cal Bowl year was my freshman year and the stadium was pretty backed towards the end of the season.
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