Mandel’s Mailbag: Who will Stanford hire? Where will Deion Sanders be in 5 years?

“What do you do in the offseason?” they ask. Oh, simply write a few Energy 4 head coach getting fired in March.

Observe: Submitted questions have been evenly edited for size and readability.

With Stanford coach Troy Taylor out, who do they go after so late within the cycle? — Jeff H.

The assertion basic supervisor Andrew Luck put out Tuesday (which I’m guessing was the primary time lots of people discovered that Luck, not an athletics director, now runs Stanford soccer) mentioned they’re conducting a training search whereas additionally leaving open the potential of going with an interim coach this season. That’s most likely depending on whether or not Stanford can entice a high quality pool of candidates this late. If not, they may wish to maintain off till November when extra coaches is perhaps .

However I’d word that Kansas discovered itself on this identical predicament in March 2021 when Les Miles obtained fired over allegations of misconduct towards ladies whereas at LSU, and evidently, they obtained a very good one. And Lance Leipold, then at Buffalo, beat out one other spectacular finalist, Military’s Jeff Monken. Monken for one would make lots of sense at Stanford, however Group of 5 guys basically would doubtless be much less involved about leaving their present groups within the spring. In the event you cross on this Energy 4 job, who’s to say you’ll get one other crack?

Nonetheless, Stanford isn’t precisely a perfect P4 job today. The stadium is basically empty on Saturdays. The ACC is a clumsy match for that program. The varsity is three years behind on NIL, and whereas it plans to completely fund income sharing, it’s unclear the way it can afford it whereas receiving a 30 p.c share of convention income.

However I do suppose Luck may very well be an enormous attraction. The brand new coach goes to work instantly with a extremely revered man who’s all about soccer, slightly than an AD who’s managing 36 sports activities. And from what I’m instructed, NIL donations have gone up considerably since he obtained concerned.

If not Monken, there’s one other former service academy coach not far south on the 101 proper now: San Jose State’s Ken Niumatalolo, Navy’s former coach of 16 seasons, took the Spartans to a bowl in his first season whereas operating a full-on passing offense underneath offensive coordinator Craig Stutzmann. I don’t suppose you possibly can go flawed with both Niutmatalolo or Monken, whose crew simply received 12 video games final season.

Which of those is more than likely to be the case 5 years from now? — Jason Okay., East Lansing, Mich.

a) Deion Sanders is teaching the Dallas Cowboys.

b) Deion Sanders is teaching at Florida State.

c) Deion Sanders is teaching an FCS crew.

d) Deion Sanders is teaching a mid-level bowl crew at Colorado

I’ve a special order immediately than I might have a 12 months in the past. I do suppose Deion is dedicated to Colorado. If he needed to be the coach of the Cowboys he most likely may have landed the job a few months in the past. As an alternative, after that temporary flirtation, he mentioned, “I know it’s cute, but I couldn’t coach pro ball,” lamenting the shortage of depth in NFL practices (not the primary motive I might have guessed, however that’s what he mentioned).

What we will’t predict is whether or not his dedication to Colorado will stay as robust if he has a tough first season with out Sheduer, Travis and Shilo. Notably, he’s but to signal a brand new contract, one which athletic director Rick George first talked about he was discussing along with his coach in early December. Sanders is within the third 12 months of his unique five-year deal, which paid him $5.7 million in 2024. Good cash for many of us, however on this planet of school teaching that ranked 38^th within the nation, according to USA Today.

And whereas I’ve by no means heard Deion complain publicly about something with Colorado, it’s no secret that faculty’s NIL assets are usually not nice. And today that’s the No. 1 requirement for holding any coach completely happy long-term.

Of these choices, I’m going with B (Florida State), adopted by D (Colorado), adopted by A (Cowboys). I’m not even contemplating the FCS choice.

Florida State is his college, and Florida State may very well be yet one more unhealthy 12 months from having to interchange Mike Norvell. Whereas it’s not an SEC or Large Ten job, FSU is about to be a lot nearer to these financially than is Colorado thanks partly to the ACC now distributing TV income based mostly on colleges’ TV rankings. Which may be coming on the proper time for FSU. It’s going to value north of $50 million to purchase out Norvell after this season if it involves that.

All that being mentioned, my precise No. 1 Deion situation 5 years from now could be one thing Jason didn’t listing: Out of teaching, full-time TV discuss present host.

The season is just a few months away. What large video games are you wanting ahead to going to and masking? Perhaps High 5 from Weeks 1-3? — Jeff H.

My high 5 would possibly differ barely from others:

1. LSU at Clemson (Week 1): It’s an important sport for each head coaches. Brian Kelly is 0-3 in season-openers at LSU, all of them towards high-profile foes, which has harm his fame. And Dabo Swinney obtained waxed by Georgia in final 12 months’s opener. He must show he can nonetheless compete with upper-echelon opponents outdoors the ACC.

2. Texas at Ohio State (Week 1): Whereas extra glamorous than LSU-Clemson, this one is available in barely decrease for me simply because the results for the shedding crew is perhaps negligible. However I’m clearly curious to see the Arch Manning and Julian Sayin eras start.

3. Michigan at Oklahoma (Week 2): I wrote about this one in additional depth final week, however this will probably be our first glimpse of the Brent Venables Makeover at Oklahoma, most notably former Wazzu quarterback John Mateer’s first large sport. Maybe Michigan freshman Bryce Underwood’s too.

4. Notre Dame at Miami (Week 1): Notre Dame’s first sport post-CFP run is a Sunday evening particular towards a semi-rival. And will probably be our first time seeing former Georgia QB Carson Beck in a Hurricanes uniform.

5. Georgia at Tennessee (Week 3): This would be the first large SEC sport of the season. There are going to be an entire lot of latest faces on Georgia’s protection. And I’d prefer to see indicators of enchancment from Vols QB Nico Iamaleava.

Honorable point out: TCU at North Carolina (Week 1). We’re all going to tune in that Monday evening to see Invoice Belichick on the UNC sideline for the primary time, however I’m undecided the sport itself will probably be a basic.

Will a Colorado-Syracuse joint scrimmage occur, and can we see extra of this in lieu of spring video games? — Brian S.

The faculties have filed a waiver to obtain an exception to an NCAA bylaw ­that limits it to 12 regular-season contests – sport or scrimmage – towards outdoors competitors. The FBS Oversight Committee is predicted to debate that waiver request at its common April 10 assembly, which is reducing it awfully shut given Colorado’s spring sport is on April 19.

I do not know if will probably be granted, however this looks like certainly one of these guidelines that was enacted one million years in the past (1992 to be actual) and it’s unclear why it existed within the first place. Lots of guidelines again then have been pushed by a want to scale back bills for the members, however that ship has lengthy since sailed. If Colorado needs to foot the invoice to fly the Syracuse soccer crew to Boulder, so be it.

If it occurs, and if it goes effectively, you’d must suppose different coaches would take into account following swimsuit. As a result of now you might have a legit alternative to guage your roster towards somebody apart from their very own teammates. The harm danger remains to be there, the poaching menace (if it’s even actual) remains to be there, however maybe the advantages outweigh the dangers at that time.

I hope it occurs. If it does, I’ll undoubtedly watch.

If the present development continues the place the SEC is a no-show in nationwide championship video games, will everybody else lastly get up and cease giving reverence to Greg Sankey and SEC? — Byron V.

Sure. However, sorry to be the bearer of unhealthy information, it’s not going to proceed.

The Home settlement will pressure colleges to publicly prioritize their sports activities. Is having a superb ladies’s soccer crew extra necessary than signing a superb defensive deal with prospect? It will likely be fascinating. Who will go all in on soccer and who will unfold the wealth? — Melissa B.

As of now it seems all P4 colleges that play soccer are going all in on soccer. Georgia introduced in February it plans to allocate $14 million of the $20.5 million cap on soccer, and that’s change into a generally referenced quantity. Tellingly, Maryland, identified extra as a basketball college, introduced that very same $14 million soccer quantity, a lot to the chagrin of males’s basketball coach Kevin Willard, who’s been utilizing his NCAA event press conferences to outwardly leverage curiosity from Villanova towards Maryland.

It’s not shocking. Soccer accounts for 60 to 80 p.c of income at most colleges. And it drives realignment. Everybody needs to make sure they’ve a related soccer program if/when the following shoe drops – particularly if it’s a Tremendous League. However it undoubtedly stands to places stress on colleges corresponding to Duke, North Carolina and Kentucky, the place it’s no secret which sport the followers care about most. I’m significantly fascinated to see what Kentucky does, given it’s going to be extremely costly to fund a aggressive SEC soccer roster.

As for different sports activities, definitely colleges might want to reserve funds for girls’s basketball, the place the highest gamers are actually incomes effectively into the six figures. However I’m undecided about the remaining. As a lot as Vanderbilt cares about baseball and Oklahoma cares about softball, the truth is most of these gamers aren’t making large cash. In the event you allocate, say, $2 million on baseball transfers, chances are you’ll be inventing a market that doesn’t exist.

Lastly, as I’ll say each week till confirmed in any other case, collectives aren’t going away. In the event you’re Duke, you might be able to spend two-thirds of your price range on soccer understanding the donors will gladly pitch in for a McDonald’s All-American. However nobody will say that out loud as a result of they in some way imagine the fabled Deloitte clearinghouse goes to outlive the moment authorized challenges.

With all the current dialogue round spring video games, why do coaches like them? Constructing pleasure across the fan base? Really consider expertise? Different? It might appear to me that with the quantity of apply time these groups have already got, the harm danger isn’t precisely value it anymore. — Brennon M., Idaho Falls

Humorous it’s best to ask that. Given all of the coaches racing to ditch spring video games, I’d remind of us that there was no greater proponent of them than the best coach within the historical past of the game, Nick Saban. Alabama at all times held a “true” spring sport, Group White vs. Group Crimson, nearly at all times on ESPN, no funky scoring system, and many others. And he made an enormous deal of getting as many followers there as potential. There have been 58,710 at his final one in 2023. He thought-about it a useful alternative to guage less-proven guys in a game-like setting.

Thoughts you, most of his tenure predated NIL and the portal, so he didn’t must take care of the current-day considerations of roster poaching. However even some present coaches suppose that’s an overblown concern. In any case, tampering is an every-day factor in faculty soccer, not simply in mid-April.

As I’ve mentioned beforehand, spring video games are for the followers. It’s a short second throughout the longest offseason in sports activities for the oldsters who spend their hard-earned cash supporting their crew to see the fellows in uniform and get a sneak peek at subsequent 12 months’s crew. Maybe holding fan fests and glorified practices can have the identical impact and it’ll prove nobody misses spring video games in any respect. I actually am disenchanted.

Hey, Stew: In the event you have been making a soccer crew utilizing Disney film characters, who would you decide and what place would they play? — Brian S., Buford, Ga.

I don’t have a lot to contribute right here, however lots of commenters did for those who’d prefer to learn their nominations.

Look into the crystal (foot)ball and predict any G5 wins vs. energy convention groups this fall. In the event you had completed this yearly for the previous 5-10 years, is the quantity trending up, down, or comparatively steady? And what does that development say in regards to the well being of the FBS degree? — Bret C.

It is a significantly well timed query, in gentle of this 12 months’s no-Cinderella NCAA males’s basketball event.

These upsets are undoubtedly trending down in soccer, and I feel we all know why. The most effective G5 gamers are shifting as much as P4 as a result of they’ll play straight away and make significantly extra NIL cash. In keeping with The Athletic’s Manny Navarro, there have been 66 G5 gamers who each earned first-team all-conference honors final season and returned to varsity this 12 months. Of these 66, 42 are actually at P4 applications.

Do not forget that nice 2021 Cincinnati crew within the AAC that beat a top-5 Notre Dame crew on the street and reached the Playoff? Its roster would have been finalized shortly earlier than NIL went into impact that summer time. I’m wondering how lots of the Bearcats’ 9 subsequent draft picks — together with Sauce Gardner, Desmond Ridder and Coby Bryant — would have nonetheless been in Clifton by then have been the switch market what it’s immediately.

We are going to nonetheless see G5-over-P4 wins, however today it’s principally high G5 groups knocking off mediocre P4 groups, like UNLV final season beating 4-8 Houston, 5-7 Kansas and 5-7 Oregon State, or Memphis profitable at … 2-10 Florida State. It’s most likely not potential immediately for Louisiana Tech to beat SEC champion Alabama (1999) or James Madison to beat ACC champion Virginia Tech (2010). And Appalachian State-Michigan (2007)? Somebody would have scooped up Mountaineers star quarterback Armanti Edwards for $1.5 million to $2 million previous to that season.

All of which rings unhappy, however, these children’ livelihoods are extra necessary than my leisure.

That is under no circumstances an exhaustive listing, however just a few to contemplate this coming season: Toledo over Kentucky, UNLV over UCLA, Tulane over Northwestern and Memphis over Arkansas.

Will the Cincinnati Bearcats have an opportunity to win the Large 12? — E.B.

Completely. However so will 15 different groups.

(High photograph of Military coach Jeff Monken: Danny Wild / Imagn Photographs)