Al Golden Era Moving To South Side

Temple Head Coach Al Golden is following in the steps of Lebron James, and will take his coaching talents to South Beach to become the new head coach of the Miami Hurricanes.

After leading Temple to a 8-4 season, the Owls were snubbed when they were left out of a bowl game, even though they held wins over BCS-bowl bound UCONN and Army.  Even the Cadets made a bowl and will face SMU in the Armed Forces Bowl.

Maybe that played a role in Golden’s decision.  Regardless you can understand why he was accept an offer from the Hurricanes.

Miami, who finished 7-5, earned a bid to play Notre Dame in the Sun Bowl, even though they finished with one less win than Temple.   Coaching at Miami would give Golden a shot to play in a postseason bowl every season, while coaching at Temple would continue to be nothing more than a rebuilding process.

Golden has gone to extraordinary measures to put Temple on the map. He guided them to their first bowl last season after a 30 year timeframe in which the Owls never earned a bid to play in a bowl. Prior to the Golden Era in Temple, the Owls went 0-11 the season before he took over. He transformed a winless team into a bowl bound team, which made him a hot commodity.

Golden will be taking over for Randy Shannon, who did a decent job with the Hurricanes after becoming head coach in 2007, but he wasn’t living up their storied tradition. His firing was somewhat unexpected, but it shows that Miami wants more than just a 7-5 record and a mediocre bowl game.

The fact that the ACC has an automatic bowl bid for the conference winner, will give Golden a chance to coach in his first BCS bowl game, something that would probably never have happened had he remained at Temple.

This year’s ACC champion, Virginia Tech, went 11-2, but will lose 14 seniors, including quarterback Tyrod Taylor, following their Orange Bowl matchup against Stanford.  Miami, on the other hand, will return quarterback Jacory Harris in 2011, and will be one of the ACC favorites come next season.

The opportunity couldn’t be passed up in Golden’s case. Yes, he could have waited for Joe Paterno to call it quits in Happy Valley, but no one, not even Joe Pa, knows when he will retire.

Temple won’t be able to replace Golden because he made the program into what it is today, and he put them in a position to compete in every game.

As of now, there are no knownpossible replacements; however, I’m sure possible names will be thrown around until an official decision is made.