UCLA football’s Bob Chesney is talk of town for all the right reasons…
CHICAGO — DeShaun Foster mumbled. Bob Chesney articulated.
Foster went silent. Chesney barely paused.
Foster said little of substance. Chesney bought a tangible imaginative and prescient.
UCLA coach Bob Chesney addresses the media Wednesday at Big Ten media days in Chicago. IMAGN IMAGES by way of Reuters Connect
It’s just one opening monologue, and sure, it received’t achieve his team a single yard, however man, oh man, did UCLA’s new soccer coach nail it Wednesday in his opening remarks at Big Ten media days.
Chesney was poised. He was confident. He fully mesmerized a ballroom crammed with reporters along with his ability to talk for more than 4 minutes without seemingly taking a breath.
This was wholly not like what occurred to another UCLA coach making his media days debut two years in the past. Remember that unlucky incident? The Ignominy in Indianapolis?
Foster muttered his means via 45 seconds of mainly nothing before wanting round like an anxious child ready for somebody to yank him off the stage in a fifth-grade play.
To Foster’s credit score, he delivered a reputable monologue at the same event a yr later, nevertheless it was already clear he wasn’t minimize out for the job in demeanor — or a lot of the rest on the technique to being sacked three games into his second season.
Enter Chesney, who exudes the confidence of a salesman who’s been told you’re going to take the deal before you are taking it.
Wearing a darkish swimsuit with a bluish-silver grey tie and powder blue socks, Chesney instantly acknowledged his perception in the model he must rebuild.
“There’s no better place I’d rather be at this moment in time,” he said. “I strongly believe in the power of what UCLA is.”
Chesney has received in all places he has coached, and he expects to continue that with the Bruins. Icon Sportswire by way of Getty Images
He well didn’t box himself right into a nook when requested about expectations for his first season, saying that he wouldn’t put any limits on what his team may obtain and supposed to assault each day with urgency and relentlessness.
“To me,” Chesney said, “success looks like a united, disciplined group that continues to grow every moment they have. I want to lead the nation in development.”
At the threat of making an excessive amount of of his first seven months on the job, Chesney looks as if the good mix of UCLA coaches past. He combines the charisma of Terry Donahue with the hearth of Jim Mora and the emotional intelligence of Dick Vermeil.
Even before Chesney took the stage right here, he was hailed by Big Ten Network analyst Jake Butt as “maybe the best hire of the offseason. Look for UCLA to take a major step forward.”
Belief in the Bruins doesn’t yet match the buzz round their coach. Even with star quarterback Nico Iamaleava among a sprinkling of achieved returners, UCLA was picked to complete twelfth in the 18-team Big Ten in a single media ballot and thirteenth in another.
It’s as much as Chesney to make his first team one that exceeds expectations.
An important caveat in all this talk about Chesney as a savior is that Foster also received each of his first two offseasons. He bought followers with a welcoming strategy previous to his first season and then made the crucial pivot to overtake his teaching workers after going 5-7 in Year 1.
None of it made any distinction for a coach who was gone after an 0-3 start to Year 2.
Certainly, there stay lots of unknowns in terms of Chesney.
Will the components that has labored in all places he’s been — from Assumption and Salve Regina to Holy Cross and James Madison — achieve one of faculty football’s most cutthroat conferences? Chesney’s groups reached a bowl game or the playoffs by Year 2 at every earlier cease, however those groups didn’t must face Ohio State or Michigan to get there.
Can Chesney’s James Madison transfers elevate UCLA in the same means that Curt Cignetti’s JMU transplants made Indiana an instantaneous national title contender?
How will Chesney react to robust questions after a nasty choice or a three-game shedding streak? While the LA media is probably not the hardest bunch out there, it’s far more skeptical than the largely fawning coverage Chesney acquired at JMU.
Chesney has some important expertise to work with in Year 1, including 10 gamers who accompanied Chesney on the cross-country transfer from Harrisonburg, Va. At least a handful are anticipated to be starters, most notably edge rusher Sahir West, vast receiver Landon Ellis and working again Wayne Knight.
Chesney also stored his workers largely intact, from offensive coordinator Dean Kennedy to defensive coordinator Colin Hitschler to the strength workers.
“The continuity part is really reassuring to me and sets you at ease just a little bit better when you know the offense that’s being run, you know how those players are being communicated with,” Chesney said. “You know the same thing on the defensive side, the special teams side. You also know the same thing in the strength and conditioning side. So I think all those elements are reassuring to me to know who we are, to know these guys speak our same language.”
The schedule ought to assist Chesney attain a bowl game in his debut season. Nonconference games against California, San Diego State and Nevada are winnable, and only one Big Ten game — at Oregon — seems in any other case. Sure, beating Michigan on the highway and USC at the Rose Bowl shall be robust as nicely, however Chesney didn’t get right here by only successful games through which his groups have been favored.
When he was completed along with his 11-minute spiel Wednesday, Chesney descended from the stage and acquired a handshake and pat on the shoulder from his boss, UCLA athletics director Martin Jarmond.
It was a job nicely accomplished and maybe the start of one thing particular.
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