What now for UNLV’s woeful football program?
Well, UNLV football fans, a promising season — that could have ended 8-4, with a bowl game and 15 extra days of much-needed practice — came to a disappointing end with Saturday’s 23-16 loss to a two-win Nevada team.
Last week on the local ESPN radio station, UNLV Athletic Director Desiree Reed-Francois said she would sit down with Coach Tony Sanchez after the season and ask what he needs to be successful. She reiterated that if we are going to keep score, we might as well win championships. I’d love to be a fly on the wall at that meeting.
Odds are she will retain Mr. Sanchez for one more year but light a fire for a winning season and a bowl game. Assuming this is the state of the union for UNLV football, it is evident that some of the assistant coaches must be replaced and a quarterback coach needs to be brought in to develop Armani Rogers.
Ms. Reed-Francois comes from the big-boy ACC football school of Virginia Tech. She has worked in a successful environment, so I hope she knows what it takes to create and manage a successful football program. Let’s also hope she will take the bull by the horns and start the process of turning around the program with the full support of the administration, students, alumni and big-money donors in town. Otherwise, all the anticipated hoopla over the new stadium scheduled to open in 2020 is just that … hoopla.
