NFL's Buccaneers Shouldn't Expect Great Things from Former Rutgers Coach Schiano

The Tampa Bay Buccaneers believe they got the best man available for their head coaching job. I don't know what games they've been watching, but having been in New Jersey myself for all 11 seasons of Greg Schiano's tenure at Rutgers University, I think they're going to be disappointed.

Turning around a moribund college program with a track record of mediocrity is one thing. Winning in the ever-changing NFL, with much different player personnel, is a whole different animal.

Schiano is undoubtedly a tremendous recruiter, one of the best snake-oil salesmen out there. He got some talented New Jersey high-school football stars (such as Anthony Davis) to stay home in the Garden State and play college ball at Rutgers during his decade-plus tenure and he did get the Scarlet Knights to bowl games on a regular basis. Not any major bowls, mind you—but when you've gone to exactly one bowl in over 100 years of football until the 21st century, beggars definitely can't be choosers.

Coaching NFL players, who can carry more money in their wallet than some head coaches make in a year, is going to be different. There is no holding a kid's scholarship over his head if he doesn't perform or doesn't go to class. More of dealing with major egos and attitudes, or players who complain to the owner if they're not getting enough carries, touches or what have you. 

Nick Saban, with his three national titles with LSU and Alabama, couldn't hack it in the NFL. Neither could Bobby Petrino of Arkansas, who failed in less than one season with the Atlanta Falcons or Dennis Erickson, who couldn't get the job done with the Seattle Seahawks. Schiano, who went 68-67 overall at Rutgers with five non-descript bowl wins, doesn't figure to fare any better. A good start wouldn't be a tell-tale indicator of success—Bucs fans can tell you what a great start Raheem Morris had (well, at least in his second season, where they won 10 games).

You got the feeling here in NJ that Schiano was sometimes looking at greener (or perhaps bluer) pastures while he was coaching the Scarlet Knights in New Brunswick. He spurned both Miami and Michigan to stay at Rutgers; but being a former Penn State assistant, it was always believed that Schiano most wanted to succeed Joe Paterno when the latter finally stepped down at Beaver Stadium.

Well, everyone knows now how Happy Valley isn't so happy anymore, that Joe Pa has gone to that big coaching box in the sky and that the PSU administration probably won't hire anyone who had any ties to the Nittany Lions football program in the past 20 or so years.

So it's onto the NFL for the defensive-minded Schiano, who doesn't have to recruit players in Tampa Bay. Getting them to suit up for the Buccaneers will be up to the general manager. It's in the realm of game planning that Schiano will be sorely tested—it's also where he falls short. He's simply not a good in-game coach and has a lot of trouble making adjustments on the fly, especially on offense.

Time and again Rutgers came up short in big games in his 11 seasons, most notably by never beating West Virginia to win the Big East. The 2006 season when the Scarlet Knights topped Louisville on national TV was a magical run, but that was six years ago. Rutgers can't rest on those laurels forever.

The school also cut varsity programs like swimming and fencing, which produced Rhode Scholars and also brought in donations from some well-heeled alumni, in the last few years because they weren't revenue-producers. That's more on former athletic director Robert Mulcahy than Schiano, however.

Still, football became everything at Rutgers, but eventually it went as far as it was going to go under Schiano. Good, but not great. Close, but not close enough.

Keep chopping, we've got to work harder, we'll get better. That's what Schiano preached year after year, all the way until a 40-22 loss at UConn in the 2011 regular-season finale. A win there could have meant a share of the Big East crown and a possible BCS bowl berth to the Scarlet Knights, whose program high point is probably still a 37-10 Texas Bowl win over Kansas State in 2006.

This season Schiano switched to a freshman QB in Gary Nova, who made mistakes and produced back-to-back losses in two important Big East games against Louisville and West Virginia. Schiano stuck with Nova before finally going back to sophomore signal-caller Chas Dodd, who basically got benched after one bad game. Dodd proceeded to lead Rutgers to four wins in its last five games, including a 27-13 Pinstripe Bowl win over Iowa State in Schiano's final game in the Scarlet Knights' saddle.

The Scarlet Knights were already going to be missing wide receiver Mohamed Sanu next season, who is off to the NFL after three outstanding seasons at High Point Solutions Stadium. Now their head coach is gone, just before national signing day, although it would have been worse if recruits signed with Rutgers to play for Schiano and then found out he was leaving. At least he had the decency to do that.

Schiano had a pretty sweet deal at Rutgers. He had $2 million-plus annual salary, a home built for him just about on campus and a stadium nearby that underwent significant expansion for everyone who wanted to jump on the Scarlet bandwagon. Now the stadium doesn't sell out, and its now-former head coach owes the school $800,000 for leaving before his contract was up in 2016.

Schiano has left New Jersey saying he hoped that Rutgers would win a national championship and Tampa Bay would win a Super Bowl. Don't hold your breath waiting for either one, especially that Super Bowl part.