by Mikovio » August 2nd, 2018, 4:43 pm
Wardle is about where I'd expect going into year 4, showing slow but steady improvement. The way he did the rebuild is a bit slower than most, because he went almost exclusively with freshman for each class, and the first class wasn't going to wow anybody given the late spring start-- only DLO is a starter from that initial class going into their senior year, and Van Bree the only other contributor. Brown, Bar, Kennell, Childs are the meat of this team and were just soph and frosh last year. What I will say about the first class is they were all good kids, stayed out of trouble, not lazy, and set a good cultural foundation.
Marshall was able to short circuit his rebuild by bringing in JUCOs and meshing them together, and at the same time establish a culture ("Play Angry"). It was a helluva feat. There was no short circuiting Wardle's rebuild-- his two JUCOs (McGlaston and Bile) were near total flameouts. We might still be a year away from what he's been building towards but I expect more steady progress.