Jim McElwain
Head Coach: Colorado State University
Current Record: 22-16
Age: 52
Your Christmas wish came true Gator fans. A new head coach has been hired and will be introduced soon. Jim McElwain was lured away from the mountainous range in Fort Collins, Colorado and Colorado State University by Jeremy Foley and the University of Florida.
In an effort to give Gator fans all pertinent information about your new head coach, we have compiled a snapshot of McElwain and his career.
His record as a head coach (listed above) is going to be the first, and maybe only thing some people look at. But let’s be better than that. Let’s look beyond. In his three years as head coach at CSU, the team has improved drastically each year.
His first year there, 2012, the team went 4-8, losing six in a row at one point. Since then though, the Rams have gone 8-6 in 2013 and then a run of 10-2 in 2014.
When discussing new head coaches, one word has consistently come up: offense.
McElwain’s first year at Colorado, his team had an average scoring offense of 21.17 PPG, which ranked 100th in the nation.
His second year, the Rams jumped up 77 spots in the FBS scoring rankings, putting up 36.2 PPG.
In 2014, McElwain’s numbers took a slight nudge backwards to 35.9 PPG, good enough for 24th in the nation. That is without postseason stats added in.
2014 Season
The second loss of this season came on a field goal as time expired, giving Air Force the 27-24 win.
In six of the Rams ten wins, they outscored opponents by double digits. This has placed their passing offense as 7th best in the nation. The rushing game suffers at the passing game’s expense, but it is all brought together to still score an average of 35.9 points per game, which is good for 25th in the nation.
I can already hear the arguments “but that’s not against SEC defenses.”
He’s Done It Before
Let’s take a quick trip back to 2011. McElwain was roaming the sidelines in crimson that year, kicking butt and taking names as the Alabama offensive coordinator.
During that national championship year, the Tide put up 2,797 passing yards (Gators have 1,988 so far in 2014); and 2,788 on the ground (Florida with 2,084 in 2014).
That’s a differential of nine yards, so we can go ahead and call it a balanced attack.
Granted he had AJ McCarron as quarterback and a backfield that consisted of Trent Richardson AND Eddie Lacy, but McElwain can take credit as the coordinator.
Not impressed? Then let’s go back a little farther to 2009.
For it was in 2009 that the Crimson Tide faced a certain team known as the Florida Gators in a little game for the SEC Championship. This was Tebow’s swan song and a chance to repeat as SEC Champions. Oh, and Florida had a stifling defense. The Gators had only been allowing 253 yards per game and a measly 12.4 points per game.
McElwain’s offense put up 490 yards, nearly twice the amount of yardage that the Gator defense had allowed all year. Of those yards 251 were rushing. And it made this happen…
There are some initial drawbacks. His recruiting numbers haven’t been great, although it stands to reason that could change when he’s offering an SEC school over a Mountain West school. In the Rams 2014 recruiting class, there is only one four star recruit, Deionte Gaines out of Orlando, Florida.
There’s also the small matter of $7.5 million. That’s McElwains’ buyout from his CSU contract. Add that to the $6.3 million Florida will still owe Will Muschamp and that comes out to a cool $13.8 million. Is Jim McElwain worth the initial $13.8 it will take just to get him into a contract with Florida that will then pay him more money? Well Jeremy Foley evidently believes so. And it should be pointed out, there are ways to get that number down.
As McElwain hangs up his snow skis and prepares to arrive in the Sunshine State, Gator Country will continue to have more information on the new hire.
For now, you can at least breath a little easier having pulled back the wrapping paper to get a glimpse of your Gator Christmas gift.