Week 13’s Worst: Maryland Meltdown, A Most Ruthless Firing, Sun Devil Slide

Maryland basketball suffered one of the most memorable end-of-game collapses a decade ago, surrendering a 10-point advantage to Duke in the final minute. Now the Terrapin griders have a meltdown as memorable (or forgettable, depending on your perspective).

Randy Edsall’s first season at his “dream job” won’t make for many restful nights in the off-season, but it’s unlikely any one game will have the Terp head coach reaching for a glass of warm milk as much as Saturday’s contest vs. NC State. Maryland came into Carter-Finley Stadium and redecorated the place, seemingly thwarting the Pack’s bid for a bowl game in the first 30 minutes.

NCSU faithful rained boos down on the team as they headed to the locker room at halftime. A Terp lead that swelled to 41-14 gave the impression it was 2-9 Maryland, not 6-5 NCSU, playing for the postseason. Then a strange thing happened. The Pack exploded midway through the third quarter on the kind of run that were it to occur on XBox would prompt a gamer to shut down the power.

Mike Glennon spent all season known as the quarterback chosen over Russell Wilson. He should now be known as the engineer of a 42-point streak lasting just over 20 minutes that propelled the Pack into the bowl picture. His six touchdowns led NCSU to one of the most wild comebacks in recent memory.

The unpredictable pendulum swing for Maryland is indicative of the entire first season under Edsall. The Terps sent out Ralph Friedgen a season ago with nine wins and a bowl game win, then returned to go 2-10 with just one win over the FBS (Miami in Week 1). So drastic is the swing, it has prompted some like John Feinstein to call for an Edsall ouster — after just one season. Dramatic? Yes. Fair? Probably not. Realistic?

Well, today another head coach was fired after just two seasons. Turner Gill was sent packing from Kansas after his team let a double digit lead slip vs. rival Missouri. Obviously leashes are getting shorter as athletic departments rely on winning football programs to generate the big bucks.

Gill peaked in 2008 when his Buffalo Bulls topped previously unbeaten Brady Hoke’s Ball State Cardinals in the MAC Championship. It’s astounding how different the trajectory of each coaches’ career has been since that December meeting. Gill’s Jayhawk teams struggled, and struggled mightily. Could Gill’s lack of success be attributed to previous head coach Mark Mangino’s recruiting? That question is the reason coaches were typically afforded four years at the helm before decisions on their future were rendered, barring extraordinary circumstances.

The circumstances at KU could be described as extraordinary. A Jayhawk program just four years removed from the Orange Bowl ranked near the bottom of virtually every measurable category, including a dubious 120 (dead last) in points allowed, a byproduct of playing the most prolific offenses in college football. Where KU’s coaching search takes it will be interesting. The MAC has been fertile ground for winning coaches, but a MAC alum just cashed out at Lawrence. A coordinator from a higher profile program could suit the Jayhawks’ needs, although that’s what Mangino was when he set up shop.

Revolving doors suggest problems wider than individual staffs, and the same programs seem to be hunting for miracle workers with regularity. Illinois and Arizona State were both ranked when they squared off in September — perhaps unfamiliar territory for each. Each went on skids to end their seasons with matching 6-6 records and one coach on the unemployment line, and the other rumored to follow.

Ron Zook was handed his walking papers from UI today. His successor will mark the program’s fifth coach in two decades. Should ASU sever ties with Dennis Erickson, whose 0-4 finish is only slightly less embarrassing than Zook’s 0-6 run, the next Sun Devil coach will likewise be the fifth in the same time frame.

ASU’s loss to Cal on Friday night was the kind of landmark defeat that seals a coach’s fate. For the second home game in as many efforts, the Sun Devils surrendered a second half lead. ASU led in the final 30 minutes of all four of its current losing streak defeats, in fact. The Sun Devils’ lost grip was evident in more than Isi Sofele and CJ Anderson’s long rushes or Zach Maynard’s connections with Keenan Allen. ASU exhibited its frustration in a manner only compounding the team’s problems,

committing personal foul penalties that aided the Golden Bears’ efforts

.

Friday night felt like a lifetime away from when the Sun Devils, and Vontaze Burfict, were dominating another California-based team.

ASU and Illinois are universities with fan bases and athletic departments that believe in the sleeping giant potential for their football teams. Akron’s lack of gridiron success is more understandable, but in no way does that make Rob Ianello’s firing any more comprehensible — or less unconscionable, for that matter.

He was released via phone call on Saturday; a phone call he received driving to his mother’s funeral. The Zips were 2-22 in Ianello’s two seasons as head coach — a shoddy mark indeed. Yet, the Zips have all of eight winning seasons and one bowl appearance in the program’s 25 years of Division I-A/FBS competition. Such a longstanding lack of success is hard to undo, particularly in two seasons, and the means by which Ianello learned of his itchy trigger finger firing won’t make the university’s “national coaching search” any easier.

Coaches have myriad pressures to address, most recognizable wins and losses. Some matters are completely out of their hands. Such was the case with a quickly made-viral video of Gus Malzahn’s wife, Kristi, unloading some verbal diarrhea in a most surprising venue.