Rebuilding the Rebuild

Let me tell you a story about a college football team. We'll call them "Tech".

In 2022, Tech hired a new head coach to fix an abundance of issues created by his predecessor. Culture was low. Roster talent was lower. And the lack of fan morale combined with the buyout meant that Tech needed to hire a company man. Someone with program ties who loved the place as much as the fans. And if he came cheaper... well that would be an added benefit.

They went out and hired an assistant who hadn't been on the radar for many Power Five jobs. But what he lacked in head coaching experience, he allegedly made up for it in energy, charisma, top-15 program experience and recruiting acumen.

The first year they lost...a lot, mainly because they just weren't set up to succeed (see: low talent). They recruited okay, but it became clear that they needed to dip into the transfer portal to bolster the roster and prove to the high schoolers in their talent rich radius that they were on the up again.

Tech portaled a quarterback from Texas, flooded the roster with SIXTEEN transfers and aimed to create a culture of physical defense combined with a grind-it-out running game. It wasn't always pretty, but Tech picked up a signature win in year two and scraped together six regular season wins and a trip to a C+-level Tier bowl game. (Annual reminder that the Fenway Bowl is sponsored by Wasabi. Is that the wasabi that comes with your sushi? Probably not, but I refuse to look it up.)

And as they turned things around on the field, they signed a top-35 high school class per the 247Sports Composite. They pulled in a few more crucial transfers. And in year three, Tech kept plugging along. They dropped some dumb conference games, but picked up two top-10 wins, have the 18th best recruiting class in the country, and worked hard to reinsert themselves in their talent-rich area, signing five in-state four-star prospects this cycle. They're not perfect, but they're showing progress.