Coaching staff returns intact

Continuity. Familiarity. Routine. Consistency.

Each fall, more than 100 men report to college football training camps across the nation. Getting them organized, on task and comfortable with expectations, procedures and game plans is challenging.

Having the same teachers – in this case, assistant coaches – simplifies and speeds up the process. That’s why your often hear college football coaches celebrate continuity on their staffs.

Paul Rhoads entered camp several weeks ago with the same nine full-time assistant coaches from last season. That is a plus.

The Cyclones have returned their entire football coaching staff just three times since 1995.

Dan McCarney’s first staff returned in whole for the ’96 season. Rhoads was on the Cyclones’ staff then. Gene Chizik kept his group together in his two years (2007-08) at Iowa State.

The only other time that ISU had the same staff in consecutive seasons (since ’95) was 2004-05 when Terry Allen (TE), Tony Alford (RB), Barney Cotton (OL), John Skladany (LB), Chris Ash (DB), DeMontie Cross (OLB), Todd Fitch (QB), Mike Grant (WR) and Mike Nelson (DL) were working the sidelines.

It’s fair to assume that having the same teachers with the same expectations and the same methods are a good thing. Familiarity breeds success and that intangible – in the form of the same coaching staff – will favor the Cyclones this fall.

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