The bandwagon is officially full. College Football News has named Karl Dorrell Pac-10 Coach of the Year, as reported on a web board. We cannot find the link on the CFN site itself but there is someone reporting this blurb:

Coach of the Year – Karl Dorrell, UCLA

The beleaguered coach of a year ago was the toast of the town after beating USC 13-9. Despite losing rookie NFL star RB Maurice Jones-Drew, QB Drew Olson, and starting QB Ben Olson, the Bruins got better over the course of the year thanks to a tremendous defense that should be ready to roar next year. Dorrell deserves the credit for keeping the ship afloat, even if the record was worse than 2005’s. The schedule was much harder.

If this report is true it would be a joke. It doesn’t take much apparently to win an award these days. 7-5, 4th in your conference at a school who should be competing for the championship every year, and you are awarded coach of the year. We can’t figure out what the key to winning the award is because it surely can’t be losing at home to the 7th place team, or losing to the 9th place team on the road, or losing to teams that placed higher than you in the conference, or losing 4 games in a row.

A look back at the seasons preview on CFN and we find that they indeed are drinking the kool-aid. In their season preview, CFN stated that for UCLA to have a successful season they needed to finish in the top 4 in the conference. Ok, that happened, barely, but it did. Not exactly Coach of the Year material, but that’s not all we have. CFN also said this:

The Schedule: It’s not bad as long as the Bruins can play well at home. With the offense UCLA should have, it has a puncher’s chance on the road against Notre Dame and should be able to hold its own at Oregon, Cal, and Arizona State. Winning two of those four would be a huge success, but the key will be winning in Pasadena where victories against Utah, Rice, Stanford, Arizona, Washington State and Oregon State are a must before the season ender against USC.

Dorrell did not achieve what CFN said would be a “huge success” because we did not beat 2 of the 4 teams they mentioned (ND, Oregon, Cal, ASU). Also, beating Wazzu at home was “a must” according to them and that didn’t occur either. So according to their own analysis KD did well, but Coach of the Year, not so much.

Dorrellistas will find vindication of course with such an honor, saying that experts now prove what they have long said - Dorrell is a great coach who needs more time … like a 6 year grace period and no criticism or negative comments during that time. The pendulum is swinging the other way … FSU is a pushover but this is the kind of thing that made Southern Cal overlook us.

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