Thoughts
- By Guerry Smith
- Joe Kennedy's Wave Crest
- 13 Replies
It's been a whirlwind week for me. Obviously the Tulane stuff, but also we just sold my mother's house and went to closing on it this morning after a couple of delays more than 16 months after her passing. Thank goodness that is over.
Anyway, here are some thoughts about Sumrall, Darian Mensah and other topics.
1) Mensah is gone. He, or more specifically, his agents blindsided Sumrall, who had just praised him in Sunday's bowl press conference when they learned he had entered the portal. There will be no change of heart on either side, and Tulane will get its starting quarterback from the portal. Mensah had an excellent year as a redshirt freshman but still has some growing to do. That process will take place somewhere else.
2) I expect Ty Thompson to stick around for the Gasparilla Bowl and then enter the transfer portal. Playing in the game could be a win-win for him and the team. He still never has started a game in his career, and if he plays well against the surging Gators, he will increase his portal profile immensely. I do not have it confirmed that he plans to enter the portal, but it appears pretty clear that Tulane's coaches do not consider him clear starter material. If he decides to leave before the bowl, Tulane will get clobbered. Kellen Tasby is not ready. His only action came in mop-up duty against Temple, and he was yanked for not executing the couple of plays he ran properly. Obviously he would be better prepared with real reps before the bowl rather than scout-team reps, but no one want to see him going against Florida.
3) Parker Petersen, who has a surprisingly good year, is going to get a good payday at a specific P4 school. He is leaving on good terms with the coaches, but Tulane cannot match what he is going to receive monetarily. I was surprised by his decision to enter the portal until I learned the reason.
4) I think Sumrall strongly considered the North Carolina job, but the Tar Heels clearly have a divide in their search among Belichick believers and anti-Belichick believers, making that whole situations dicey. It reminds me of Georgia Tech two years ago when the AD wanted Fritz but a lot of the other people wanted to keep Brent Key. Sumrall truly likes being at Tulane, and I think he made the right decision to stay. He can make the playoff at Tulane easier than he can at North Carolina in the next two years and will do everything in his power to make it happen. If he had left, he would have been Tulane's first one-year coach since Myron Fuller in 1921. Sumrall is better off in my opinion at Tulane than North Carolina. I also think he learned he needs to keep his players informed of his thinking. He mentioned Monday how he did that at Troy and the team played much better at the end of the year than Tulane did, when it saved its biggest stinker of the season for Army. There were plenty of factors at play, but you can't discount the thought that some players were unfocused because of the coaching uncertainty. The false starts on offense, aside from the one on Vincent Murphy for moving the ball again, were unusual, and the defense did not play with the necessary ferocity against a physical team like Army. Tulane's defense was in a world of hurt all night, but the Wave could have stayed in the game without the mistakes on offense because Army was not doing much stopping itself. The first drive had four successful plays in a row before Yulkeith Brown jumped early. Then there was Murphy's mistake, Mensah's underthow that was picked off and Josh Remetich's personal foul that sidetracked another drive. The other two possessions ended in TDs.
5) Even though Sumrall, Mensah and Sam Howard denied it, the cold weather was a factor. Warm-weather teams have insisted forever that they will not be affected by cold conditions, but they usually are. So was Tulane.
6) Tulane was utterly dominant against vastly inferior competition this year (with the exception of Rice) and played its best game of the year against Navy, which is not as good as the Wave but was not expected to get shut out 35-0 either. But there's no disputing Tulane played very poorly against three of the four best teams it faced. Oklahoma's offense, bereft of healthy wideouts and with a weak offensive line, looked pretty good against Tulane and had a hard time duplicating that performance against anyone else. Memphis did pretty much whatever it wanted offensively, and so did Army. Tulane played well against Kansas State, but the Wildcats were average in Big 12 play and not as good as they were projected to be. Beating UL in the sauna that was Cajun Field after back-to-back losses was good, but neither team played particularly well in my eyes on that day. I agree with Sumrall that there never is a need to apologize for a nine-win season that ends in the conference championship game, but Tulane did not reach its potential against the better teams on the schedule. The coaches need to figure out why.
7) I underestimated Mario Williams. He had a few too many drops, but he was not the prima donna a lot of people might have expected him to be after playing at Oklahoma and USC. He blocked downfield well and worked his butt off all year, becoming one of Sumrall's favorite players. He was a little squirrelly with the media, ducking out of multiple interview requests in the second half of the season, but he was all in for the team and was Tulane's MVP against Army, playing like a champion. Not many of his teammates joined him. He is from Tampa, so it will be interesting to see if he plays in the bowl game.
8) I do not know what Makhi Hughes will decide to do--go pro, transfer or stay. I just don't, so we'll leave it at that for the moment. He loves Tulane, though, and is not someone who likes change. A 1-2 punch of him and Jamauri McClure next year would be really good.
9) I will arrive in Florida for the bowl game on Tuesday night and be there the rest of the week. Assuming Thompson plays, it will be fun covering Tulane versus my alma matter and the program I covered for 17 years, never missing a game from 1991 through 2007. I still have one close friend who covers the Gators, but I pay almost no attention to that team during the year anymore. I burned some bridges covering them for as long as I did and quite frankly had a mixed reaction to the school and Gainesville itself in the four-and-a-half years it took to graduate from 1986-87 until the fall of 1990. I definitely prefer living in New Orleans, so thanks to my wife, a fellow native, for giving me a reason to come back in January of 2008.
Anyway, here are some thoughts about Sumrall, Darian Mensah and other topics.
1) Mensah is gone. He, or more specifically, his agents blindsided Sumrall, who had just praised him in Sunday's bowl press conference when they learned he had entered the portal. There will be no change of heart on either side, and Tulane will get its starting quarterback from the portal. Mensah had an excellent year as a redshirt freshman but still has some growing to do. That process will take place somewhere else.
2) I expect Ty Thompson to stick around for the Gasparilla Bowl and then enter the transfer portal. Playing in the game could be a win-win for him and the team. He still never has started a game in his career, and if he plays well against the surging Gators, he will increase his portal profile immensely. I do not have it confirmed that he plans to enter the portal, but it appears pretty clear that Tulane's coaches do not consider him clear starter material. If he decides to leave before the bowl, Tulane will get clobbered. Kellen Tasby is not ready. His only action came in mop-up duty against Temple, and he was yanked for not executing the couple of plays he ran properly. Obviously he would be better prepared with real reps before the bowl rather than scout-team reps, but no one want to see him going against Florida.
3) Parker Petersen, who has a surprisingly good year, is going to get a good payday at a specific P4 school. He is leaving on good terms with the coaches, but Tulane cannot match what he is going to receive monetarily. I was surprised by his decision to enter the portal until I learned the reason.
4) I think Sumrall strongly considered the North Carolina job, but the Tar Heels clearly have a divide in their search among Belichick believers and anti-Belichick believers, making that whole situations dicey. It reminds me of Georgia Tech two years ago when the AD wanted Fritz but a lot of the other people wanted to keep Brent Key. Sumrall truly likes being at Tulane, and I think he made the right decision to stay. He can make the playoff at Tulane easier than he can at North Carolina in the next two years and will do everything in his power to make it happen. If he had left, he would have been Tulane's first one-year coach since Myron Fuller in 1921. Sumrall is better off in my opinion at Tulane than North Carolina. I also think he learned he needs to keep his players informed of his thinking. He mentioned Monday how he did that at Troy and the team played much better at the end of the year than Tulane did, when it saved its biggest stinker of the season for Army. There were plenty of factors at play, but you can't discount the thought that some players were unfocused because of the coaching uncertainty. The false starts on offense, aside from the one on Vincent Murphy for moving the ball again, were unusual, and the defense did not play with the necessary ferocity against a physical team like Army. Tulane's defense was in a world of hurt all night, but the Wave could have stayed in the game without the mistakes on offense because Army was not doing much stopping itself. The first drive had four successful plays in a row before Yulkeith Brown jumped early. Then there was Murphy's mistake, Mensah's underthow that was picked off and Josh Remetich's personal foul that sidetracked another drive. The other two possessions ended in TDs.
5) Even though Sumrall, Mensah and Sam Howard denied it, the cold weather was a factor. Warm-weather teams have insisted forever that they will not be affected by cold conditions, but they usually are. So was Tulane.
6) Tulane was utterly dominant against vastly inferior competition this year (with the exception of Rice) and played its best game of the year against Navy, which is not as good as the Wave but was not expected to get shut out 35-0 either. But there's no disputing Tulane played very poorly against three of the four best teams it faced. Oklahoma's offense, bereft of healthy wideouts and with a weak offensive line, looked pretty good against Tulane and had a hard time duplicating that performance against anyone else. Memphis did pretty much whatever it wanted offensively, and so did Army. Tulane played well against Kansas State, but the Wildcats were average in Big 12 play and not as good as they were projected to be. Beating UL in the sauna that was Cajun Field after back-to-back losses was good, but neither team played particularly well in my eyes on that day. I agree with Sumrall that there never is a need to apologize for a nine-win season that ends in the conference championship game, but Tulane did not reach its potential against the better teams on the schedule. The coaches need to figure out why.
7) I underestimated Mario Williams. He had a few too many drops, but he was not the prima donna a lot of people might have expected him to be after playing at Oklahoma and USC. He blocked downfield well and worked his butt off all year, becoming one of Sumrall's favorite players. He was a little squirrelly with the media, ducking out of multiple interview requests in the second half of the season, but he was all in for the team and was Tulane's MVP against Army, playing like a champion. Not many of his teammates joined him. He is from Tampa, so it will be interesting to see if he plays in the bowl game.
8) I do not know what Makhi Hughes will decide to do--go pro, transfer or stay. I just don't, so we'll leave it at that for the moment. He loves Tulane, though, and is not someone who likes change. A 1-2 punch of him and Jamauri McClure next year would be really good.
9) I will arrive in Florida for the bowl game on Tuesday night and be there the rest of the week. Assuming Thompson plays, it will be fun covering Tulane versus my alma matter and the program I covered for 17 years, never missing a game from 1991 through 2007. I still have one close friend who covers the Gators, but I pay almost no attention to that team during the year anymore. I burned some bridges covering them for as long as I did and quite frankly had a mixed reaction to the school and Gainesville itself in the four-and-a-half years it took to graduate from 1986-87 until the fall of 1990. I definitely prefer living in New Orleans, so thanks to my wife, a fellow native, for giving me a reason to come back in January of 2008.
