Fans were clamoring for Johnson to see more playing time, and claimed Randy Shannon was a fool for no playing him as he was one of the “best” players on the roster.  Johnson showed a flash of greatness by busting out for a 71 yard touchdown run late in the game against South Florida when the Hurricanes offense was really struggling.  That made fans even more adamant that Storm Johnson needed to see the field sooner rather than later.

When Al Golden took over he instilled some new rules and some new ways of doing things and at the end of Spring Practice Storm Johnson was third on the depth chart behind Lamar Miller and Mike James.  Now Johnson has asked for his release from the university of Miami for reasons his father states is because UM’s backfield is too crowded.  He also mentioned that Storm has a desire to play closer to his mother in Georgia as another deciding factor.  Coach Al Golden indicated that Johnson was not doing the things required of him as a Miami Hurricanes Football player, and that it was a mutual decision to let him go.

The Hurricanes are loaded at running back anyway, as they have players you already know in Lamar Miller and Mike James.  They also have several players Darion Hall, Maurice Hagens, and Kevin Grooms who are waiting in the wings who are more than willing to step in and make an impact at the Miami.  You have to wonder about Johnson though, he knew how loaded the Hurricanes were at running back when he signed, and he knew how far it was from his mother.  This is more than a simple case of someone getting homesick, but only people inside the program can really say what the real issue was.  The Hurricanes aren’t going to miss a step at running back, but what school will Storm Johnson end up at?

Al Golden says this second depth chart is a result of off-season dedication, so apparently Jacory Harris has been putting in work in the off season to recover from an abysmal season.  That should be nothing new if you look at the body of work Jacory Harris always wins the job or impresses in the off season and practices, even after Randy Shannon was fired Jacory won the starting nod for the Sun Bowl.  How did that work out for the Hurricanes?  What this story says is Harris probably has a great grasp of the offense and is confident in practice, but when the game rolls around he looks impatient and confused in the pocket.  The interceptions are somehow being blamed on Randy Shannon’s coaching staff, who openly took the blame for Harri’s interception woes.

From the fan perspective large majorities are ready to see the Jacory Harris era at quarterback come to an end, and were looking to Stephen Morris to mature and take over the reins at quarterback.  The question remains will Jacory Harris start and finish the season as the Miami Hurricanes starting quarterback?  If the 2009 Jacory Harris shows up then that is a strong possibility, people forget that Harris was in the running for the Heisman trophy his first year starting and showed flashes of being the next great Miami quarterback.  The 2010 season he seemed to regress and started to let things distract him from football, everyone should be familiar with the Twitter incident the week of the Ohio State game and subsequent banning of Twitter for all Hurricanes players.  Then the Oakland Raiders overall’s incident among other odd things Harris was known for other than performance on the field.

If you look at Harris’ stats from 2009 (13 Games):

242/406 (59.6 comp %)

3352 Yards

24 Touchdowns

17 Interceptions

140.10 QB Rating

Now if you compare those stats to his 2010 numbers (9 Games):

148/270 (54.8 comp %)

1793 Yards

14 Touchdowns

15 Interceptions

116.60 QB Rating

It is very easy to see that there was a clear decline, but the truth is Stephen Morris’s numbers were not better than Harris even in a down year.  Morris had a lower completion percentage, lower QB rating, and nine interceptions in six games worth of action.  In Morris’s defense he did play against the tougher competition on the schedule than Harris did.

With a clear decline in Harris’s production, fans clamoring for someone other than him to start, and his interception issues it does not seem that this change by Al Golden will be a permanent one.  Even if Harris makes it to the beginning of the season as the starter it just does not seem likely that he is going to be able to shake all of his old issues and keep the starting job for the full season.  All Golden will probably have a very short leash with Harris and will not put up with excessive interceptions if he shows no improvement over last season.

Al Golden made what some would feel is a controversial decision by only having three open practices this spring, and only allowing players to be interviewed before practice and not after.  It has reminded some of how Randy Shannon ran the program, and there are a lot of fans who are clamoring for more access to the team.  Al Golden knows what he is doing he has opened up the program more, but has not totally swung the doors wide open because eventually that leads to problems who is around your players.

On that note a total of six Miami Hurricanes football players are suspended for the season opener against Maryland.  Seantrel Henderson, Keion Payne, Devont’a Davis, Storm Johnson, Dyron Dye, and Kelvin Cain are the six players in question.  The initial report from insidetheu.com stated the the players violated team rules, and there has been no other explanation for the suspensions from coach Golden or anyone in the Hurricanes program.  It sure seems like Golden is running just as tight of a ship as Randy Shannon did, and it’s needed because there are too many distractions in South Florida that can take players minds off of school and football.

It seems for all the talk these had when the coaching change was made about how things are so much better, and how much they respect coach Golden it sure isn’t showing.  Aside from the six players who are going to be suspended for the first game, Hurricanes starting linebacker Ramon Buchanan has been suspended indefinitely by coach Al golden after a run-in with police.  He faces several charges, including felony resisting a police officer with violence, according to court documents.  The incident occurred in Coconut Grove, minutes from campus, according to various reports.  Buchanan, 21, was charged with resisting a police officer with violence and battery on a police officer, firefighter or emergency medical care provider, both of which are felonies.

Buchanan is the first UM football player to be arrested since Robert Marve who eventually transferred to Purdue.  It seems that Al Golden has a problem on his hands, players are acting out and getting in trouble at the start of the Golden era.  It seems all the positive energy that was generated when Shannon was replaced has stalled, and with Hocutt leaving as well it looks like things may be a little unstable in Coral Gables at the moment.  The good news is that this is only spring time and the time when fans should start to pay close attention is in August when the season is about to start.  Golden does need to get some of these players back in line and fast otherwise these distractions are going to prevent this team from winning much of anything next season.

The Miami Hurricanes created a “U Tough” video that gave a glimpse inside the Spring workouts the Miami Hurricanes have been doing.  It shows Al Golden and his coaching staff putting the players through a rigorous set of workouts that had them sweating and gasping by the time it was all over.  Golden and his staff have instilled some new philosophies during spring workouts as well, like many schools there is a practice Jersey tradition where players are awarded a certain jersey for effort.  Miami has never really had this, but under Al Golden there are now four levels of jersey color a player can earn for their level of effort in workouts.

Black, Green, Orange, and White are the jersey colors that are used, and if you are wearing a white jersey then that means you are giving atrocious effort and need to step it up.  An interesting note on the workouts is that many people criticized Randy Shannon for conducting 6:00am workouts, but on Wednesdays and Fridays Al Golden has the team out there at 6:00am as well.  What people fail to realize is practices that early are designed to make you go to bed earlier, and to get you out of a comfort zone and make you work harder.

The effort this new coaching staff is putting into getting the players to be more tough and well-conditioned is a good thing for this program, but the truth is do the returning players have enough heart to make a difference with it on the field?  What Golden is hoping it will do is make practice so much harder and grueling than the games that in the fourth quarter the Hurricanes will be fresh while the other team is bent over gasping for air.

There does seem to be a new air of excitement and high expectations around the University of Miami football program.  Golden has opened up the program for the public to look into with a heavy social media blitz, and various video clips showing coaches meetings and workouts.  It seems apparent that Golden is in fact trying to reverse the tone of the Randy Shannon Era which was restrict the flow of information and keep the media and fans from getting a glimpse inside the program.  It was not something that people understood at the time, but it’s clear now that fans are enjoying the increased access to Canes football.

There is a large debate at the University of Miami about whether Shannon was as good of a recruiter as he was reported to be.  There is no denying that Shannon left some talent on this team, but some of the players did not pan out to be as good as once touted which is one of the reasons Shannon is not here anymore.  Since Al Golden has taken over the Hurricanes have been in scramble mode trying to put a staff together, prepare for a bowl game, and fill out the recruiting class.

At the under Armor All Star game in St. Petersburg, Florida the University of Miami was only represented by one player Anthony Chickillo who was one of the best players on the field at the right defensive end position.  Al Golden and his staff getting a late start did something innovative, they had a letter addressed to every player at the game waiting for them at Check-In.  Here is an excerpt of what the letter said:

At the top it read “From: MIAMI HURRICANE FOOTBALL STAFF”.

Below that: “U Put In The Work, U Paid The Price, U Earned It All”.

No other colleges did that, and it received a positive response from all of the players.  It does not seem to have initially swayed any players to change their commitment, but what it did do was let players know that the University of Miami is still a top dog in college football and is not quietly sitting in the corner satisfied with mediocrity.

Golden in his short time has solidified the commitment of Anthony Chickillo, and although he lost recruits Teddy Bridgewater and Eli Rogers to Louisville it has not affected what he is building at Miami.  Golden has received five commitments since he has taken over the head coaching position, and Miami is now in the mix for about 5 – 10 players who are committed to other programs.  Whatever Golden is doing on the recruiting trail it seems to be working as you are starting to hear kids putting Miami in their top five again.

Here are the commitments Golden has picked up so far:

Olsen Pierre 3 stars DE

Fork Union, VA Fork Union Military Academy

6’6″  280 lbs.

Dalton Botts 3 stars K

Moorpark, CA Moorpark C.C.

6’3″ 200 lbs.

Thomas Finnie 3 stars DB

Miami, FL Miami Central

5’10″ 170 lbs.

Taylor Gadbois 3 stars OL

Dallas, GA East Paulding

6’8″ 295 lbs.

Ricardo Williams 3 stars DE

Homestead, FL Homestead

6’5″ 210 lbs.

In the case of Thomas Finnie he was scheduled to fly to South Carolina to finalize his commitment to the Gamecocks, but Al Golden and staff never let him board that plane and by the end of the day he was a Hurricane commit.  Ricardo Williams was leaning heavy to sign with the North Carolina Tar Heels as he was not being recruited by Randy Shannon, but Al Golden locked up this commit who says he wanted to be a Hurricane all along.

Golden has targeted three QB’s in this class one who he has offered a scholarship already, but he is currently committed to Wake Forest.  The other two targets are waiting on an offer from the University of Miami and said they would commit if offered.  This could be one of the best salvage jobs of a recruiting class when it is all finished because Golden is getting players to de-commit form other schools to come to Miami.  That is not an easy thing to do, and one thing is for sure every living room that Al Golden and his staff sit in the parents and players have been impressed with how Golden conducts business.

Miami and Notre Dame are hard in preparation for their matchup on December 31^st in the Sun Bowl renewing one of college football’s best rivalries.  There have been mixed emotions regarding the game among Hurricane fans, with some commenting that this is merely a game against two irrelevant programs living off past glory.  The fact that the game sold out relatively quickly is an indication that most people are excited about this matchup between two of college football’s historic programs.

Miami has a lot of things riding on this game contrary to what some may think about the game being irrelevant.  The Hurricanes have a new coach in Al Golden who has already spoken to the team about how important a win over Notre Dame is no matter what the record of the two teams are.  Players have said they are going to win this game for fired coach Randy Shannon to show their support for the things he did for them during his time as coach.  Then there is the national attention this game is going to bring because of the two teams involved in it, and it will have implications as to which program is headed up and which one is headed spiraling further downward.

What does a win in the Sun Bowl truly mean for the Hurricanes though?  If Miami goes out and has a dominating performance against the Irish many will say that Randy Shannon was the problem and his removal motivated the players to reach their full potential.  If the Hurricanes have a lackluster performance and lose the game then people will blame it on the coaches left behind by Randy Shannon.  The truth is this game is all on the players, you have a lame duck coaching staff with motivation being provided by the new head coach.  The Randy Shannon scapegoat will not be an excuse if these players do not come out and perform at a high level, but the truth is this is still a bowl game that has no bearing on the season for these players.  If there is a lackluster effort or motivation people should not be surprised even though many will agree it is always a big game when Miami and Notre Dame meet.

These players have not shown much pride in the “U” on the side of their helmet all season, so why should we all of a sudden expect them to care about it now?  If you can’t come out motivated against your arch rival Florida State at home in front of a sold out crowd and Sun Shark (whatever they call it these days) stadium, then how can you put that helmet on with any dignity?  Wearing that emblem goes beyond coaching, players should want to excel because they want to continue the winning tradition that attracted them to Miami in the first place.

If they come out flat against Notre Dame that just means this group of players was never championship material to begin with.  If the team plays horribly it may almost be a vindicating force for the fired Hurricanes coach because the players did not respond to the new coach’s speech about how important it is to beat Notre Dame, or the fact that competition is going to be open at all positions.  It is really difficult to gauge anything from a bowl game when dealing with young kids, but it’s Miami vs. Notre Dame, Catholics vs. Convicts it does not get any better than this.

This is huge for Al Golden in the sense that if the players do not respond to him he is going to have his work cut out for him until he can get players in the program who do not make excuses.  Also, Golden has not exactly been making a splash in recruiting as of yet coming in during a tough period trying to salvage this recruiting class.  If the Hurricanes come out and look like an energized team that exemplifies what the Hurricane football was known for on the field, then that could energize potential recruits because Miami may be headed back in the right direction.  Even though Golden is not coaching the game this is his team, and he has already started to instill his persona throughout.  If the Hurricanes lose Golden will not be blamed of course, but it may signal that changes need to be made at some positions going forward.

This game is big because it is a potential turning point for Miami football, if the cupboards are truly stocked with talent as most seem to think then this game should not even be close.  If Randy Shannon truly was a prohibitive force then that there should be nothing left holding these players back from unleashing the full weight of their talent on the Notre Dame Fighting Irish.  Players like Adewale Ojomo and others who pointed the finger at Randy Shannon, will now have to produce and prove that their claims have some validity.  The Hurricanes should handle the Irish in the Sun Bowl, but we will see how this team responds to all that has gone on this season, and if they have the mental toughness to play to their full potential.

The Miami Hurricanes have a new leader at the helm named Al Golden, he comes in with a 27–34 record as a head coach, which has many fans skeptical as to whether this was really an upgrade over Randy Shannon.  Golden can tout that he has taken one of the worst football programs in the country from 1–11 to records of 9–4 and 8–4 respectively over the five years he has been at Temple.  There are a lot of positives with Golden coming into Miami as the new head coach, but many will consider it hardly the “home run” hire they were looking for.  Golden delivered a passionate, confident, and strong press conference on Monday to kick off his tenure as the Hurricanes head coach.

What does the hiring of Golden say about the attractiveness of the job at the University of Miami?  The last few coaching searches turned up Coker, Shannon and now Golden—hardly the murderer’s row of coaching hires that would make people take notice.

The truth is Miami made the hard press at a lot of coaches over the past 10 years, and this time they went after Jon Gruden and struck out.  Then allegedly offered Boise State’s Chris Petersen the job and he backed out of it as well.  Miami never seemed to be in the running for Harbaugh or Petrino, and the entire song and dance with Dan Mullen seemed like he was never really interested in coming to coach the Hurricanes.

It took Miami several weeks to find a coach and close the deal, and Florida lost Urban Meyer and hired Will Muschamp from Texas within a few days after allegedly being rejected by the likes of Bob Stoops and Bobby Petrino.  Florida claims that Muschamp was their guy all along, and Muschamp says he would not have left for any other job, those statements are nice and politically correct.  We know that Muschamp would have left for a lot of jobs if the price and situation were right.  Miami wanted someone with head-coaching experience as stated from the beginning, and it seems Florida was rejected just as many times as the Hurricanes were.

What this says about the Miami job is that it’s not necessarily undesirable, but it is a very unique job like no other in college football.  There are positives and negatives to that, and in reality Miami has never went and hired big-name coaches in the past.  The University of Miami has always made coaches into legends and vaulted them into their next job because of the success they found in Coral Gables.  It would seem that this hire is right in line with what Miami did in the past when it was winning national and conference titles.

Being that Golden does not have a big name and Miami has what are considered good facilities, but not ones that can stack up with some of the other power programs in college football, it will be interesting to see how Golden is able to recruit and compete against the best in the country.  The program’s history and success of sending players to the NFL are where the advantages are.  If it comes down to fan support or facilities those are issues that have to be resolved at some point, but will take time to fix.  Some believe the issue of fan support will never be fixed due to the history of Southern Florida sports fans, and there are others who say, “Just win and it will take care of itself.”

Miami is a good job, but not a great one.  It’s not as bad as Mark May made it out to be a few weeks ago when he was discussing the job on ESPN.  There is sporadic fan support, and it’s a hot seat almost the minute you take the job.  The ink from Golden’s signature is hardly dry on the contract and you already have a subset of the fan base discussing renting planes and not being happy with the hire.  Many fans think Miami deserves to pluck coaches from schools like Georgia, Arkansas and even Oklahoma and are upset that the coaching search was narrowed to coaches from Temple, UConn and the CFL.

The truth is some of those coaches have been at those schools for over six years, and although they may get on the hot seat at times, they manage to keep their job.  Miami has jettisoned coaches two times during the same period some of these coaches were employed in their current jobs, so why would they leave stability for the unknown?  For instance, coach Randy Edsall would have been a significant upgrade, but he is now a god at UConn and the expectations are low.

Taking the job at Miami is not something everyone can do, and the fact that Golden is willing to come in and take a shot at it means the fans should give him the benefit of the doubt before passing judgment.  During his press conference Golden said that the standard at Miami is winning championships and that is the only standard he will be judged by.  There were a lot of politically correct statements in Golden’s press conference which is to be expected, but he gave the impression that he knows what he is getting into and what is going to be expecting of him from the fans and administration.  The fact that he understands that concept will serve him well as he will have a limited amount of time to get things going in the right direction.

Peyton Manning took a small step back to normalcy with a win over the Tennessee Titans on Thursday night. Manning and the Colts looked like they were going to blow out the Titans in the first half, but Tennessee fought back to make it a respectable game in the end.  This put a final death blow in Tennessee’s season, and the fact that Randy Moss only played about six plays the entire game seems to signal that they won’t re-sign him next year.  The Titans have a lot of questions, who is going to play quarterback there next year since it seems that Vince Young may not be back as well, as for the Colts they are fighting with Jacksonville for their playoff lives and the teams square off next Sunday.

The Miami Hurricanes have a new head coach hiring away Temple’s Al Golden to come in and resurrect a program that was on it’s way back already under Randy Shannon.  It hardly looks like an upgrade over Shannon although Golden has done an amazing job rebuilding a Temple football program that was one of the worst in college football.  Golden seems like a fiery, young, and disciplined coach who may have the tools to lead the Hurricanes back to glory, but you have to wonder if this hire was more of who was left rather than who they wanted.  The fan base at Miami will give Golden a short honeymoon period then if he does not win, it will be the same thing all over again as the feeding frenzy will get bigger if he does not win the ACC in his first two years.

If you watched the most recent season of Spike’s The Ultimate Fighter, you saw Josh Koscheck and George St. Pierre going back and forth with mind games and verbal barbs before their showdown at UFC 124.  Well they met on Saturday, and st. Pierre pummeled Koscheck with overhand rights and lefts hooks all night.  Koscheck was decimated and reduced to a one eyed man as St. Pierre reddened and swelled his right eye to the point were it was mostly closed.  Koscheck (15-5) was battered and befuddled for the full 25 minutes, but at least he went the distance.

The Brett Favre and Jenn Sterger situation has been fairly quiet, and it seems that nothing is going to be done to Favre by the NFL.  After months filled mainly with silence and one denial of the existence of settlement talks, Brett Favre’s camp has made its first substantive communication regarding the NFL’s ongoing investigation into the question of whether Favre violated the league’s Personal Conduct Policy in 2008 via his interactions with former Jets in-house sideline reporter Jenn Sterger. With the Favre camp now convinced that litigation is inevitable, their message is simple: “Give us a lawsuit.”

The University of Miami fired their head coach Randy Shannon after a 23 – 20 overtime loss to in state upstart USF. Miami’s athletic director said that the firing had nothing to do with the USF game, and the decision would have been made regardless of the outcome.  It was a decision that shocked many in the program and took the players by surprise, but now the search for a head coach begins.  Jon Gruden has been heavily rumored to be the Hurricanes top target and rumors of a $3.4 million dollar deal were swirling on Sunday night.  Gruden released a statement and said he is committed to Monday night football, and Miami has retained a coach placement firm for $50,000 stay tuned.

The Chicago Bears cooled Michael Vick and the Philadelphia Eagles 26 – 31 on Sunday, and with that win erased any doubt that they were for real. Jay Cutler threw four touchdown passes and was relatively mistake free, and looked like the Pro Bowl quarterback that they traded for.  The Bears defense seems like it’s back to form, and with the new found efficiency on offense they may be the team to beat in the NFC.  The Atlanta Falcons may have something to say about that, but people can’t deny how good the Bears look.  The NFC race will be interesting down the stretch.

The Yankees and the face of their franchise Derek Jeter are still in a dispute over his new contract after the Yankees initial 3 year $45 million dollar offer. Jeter’s camp says they are seeking Alex Rodriguez type of money, and scoffed at the initial offering as the Yankees want Jeter to take a pay cut.  The Yankees appear willing to enhance their latest $45 million, three-year offer to retain the iconic Yankee, but are said to be unwilling to match his previous salary on a deal of at least three years. Jeter just completed a 10-year, $189-million deal that paid him about $21 million in 2010.  The Yankees may be willing to go higher, but it looks like not much higher than what they have already offered.

The Miami Heat are 9 – 8 so far this season, and coming off of a loss to the Dallas Mavericks. There is a lot of discussion about friction between the head coach and members of the big three.  This is something that was predicted by several people, and it comes down to the fact that Lebron James and Dwayne Wade may be too similar to play together.  Chris Bosh has not looked like a full member of the big three at times, and the team overall does not seem to have that much chemistry.  With the injury to Udonis Haslem, and signing of Eric Dampier things do not seem to be getting much better in South Beach.  The heat held a players only meeting after their loss to the Mavericks, who knows if the team is actually going to play better.  It has to be Bosh, Wade, and James as that is how the team was built.

Boise State made the BCS’s job easier by losing to Nevada in overtime after their kicker missed the game winning field goal at the end of regulation, then missed the field goal in overtime.  Now the three front runners for the two national title spots are TCU, Auburn, and Oregon who all have games next week.  These games next weekend are one game playoff games for Auburn and Oregon because if they win they are in the national championship game.  TCU has to hop that either South Carolina or Oregon State find a way to win which would punch their ticket to the game.  I know some fans find this exciting, but a playoff is needed badly in college football.

Randy Shannon won’t have much to be thankful about during Thanksgiving dinner, despite what he said about him “receiving support” from the university he has to be worried about his job.  From Shannon’s history though he is not worried about himself as much as he will be about his players, who have staunchly supported their coach several times.

Football at the University of Miami is at a cross roads, going into the final game against USF the Hurricanes have turmoil swirling around the entire program.  The Virginia Tech game seems to be the straw that broke the Camel’s back even though the Canes played well for most of the game, the fourth quarter left a bad taste in the mouth of a large number of fans.  Long time Shannon supporters are starting to jump ship, and former players are coming out in droves and firing pot shots and the head coach.

It's Cold In Coral Gables For Randy Shannon Right Now.

You can tell Shannon is feeling the heat because he has named Stephen Morris the starter for the game against South Florida even though Jacory Harris is healthy enough to play.  Morris has looked good in the games he has played save one quarter against Virginia Tech, and Shannon has decided that he needs to move some of his investments to the Stephen Morris portfolio.   Shannon seems to imply it will be good to have a true quarterback competition going into the spring, and Jacory Harris will have to earn the starting job back.

Shannon has already started locking up recruits for the 2012 class, and commenting on the difficulty of the schedule being the only team in the ACC that plays FSU and VT every year.  Shannon is waging political warfare like he never has before in an attempt to stem the tide rising against him.  Some of these are great moves by Shannon for self-preservation,  but there is one problem it may already be too late to save his job.

There is virtually nothing Shannon can do to save his job at this point if that decision has already been made, but if there is a spirited discussion going on behind closed doors he has only one option available to him.  Miami has to go out and beat USF 56 – 7 or something along those lines, the type of beating we have not seen at Miami over an FBS opponent in a long time.  Then if he makes it past Monday whomever the Canes play in a bowl game better get blown out as well, that is the only way to buy back some sort of confidence that things might be able to change.  That still would not be enough to get back any good will from the critics.

With the chatter of John Gruden being interested in coming to Miami seeming to gain steam very quickly, one has to wonder if his interest is true or not.  It’s all rumor at this point, but it has desperate Hurricanes fans clinging to the idea because they have lost hope.  Over at allcanes.com/blog an article was written recently about the Gruden situation, and there were a lot of good points made.  Shalala and Hocutt have not gotten where they are by being stupid and reactionary, if they listened to emotional fans they would make knee jerk reactions and that would not be good.

They are not going to make a change for the sake of making a change to appease fans whining on message boards and blog posts, whatever they decide to do will surely be calculated and planned properly.  Sure we don’t know how much money Miami has in the coffers to spend on a head coach, but a private school with no state funding and a smaller student population is at a disadvantage financially in some areas compared to public universities.    The John Gruden discussion could have an extremely positive effect on the program, or plummet it to a point that it may be hard to recover from.

Gruden won a Super Bowl in his first year with Tampa Bay (some would say with Tony Dungy’s team), and some consider him the Larry Coker of the NFL.  Gruden only had one other double digit win season after the Super Bowl year, and he had a continuous carousel of quarterbacks he collected and messed around with.  Gruden is a big name, but there is not enough there to say he is a sure thing to lead the Hurricanes back to glory.  These are the things Hocutt and Shalala have to look at when they make a decision on the coaching situation.

It is not an easy decision on what to do next, and the decision to fire Shannon is going to be based on what coaches are available to take the job and want to come here.  Gary Patterson, Chris Petersen are two names Canes fans would love to have in Coral Gables, but who says they would leave the god like situations they are in right now?  Firing Shannon for another young coach or an unproven assistant has a lot of risk as well.

Regardless of what decision is made Hurricanes fans will be waiting anxiously on Sunday to see if there is movement in Coral Gables.  The fan base is split by those who want Shannon gone, and those who want to give him one more year.  If the Hurricanes convincingly win the last two games of this season, then some of that bad taste won’t taste as bitter.