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Is it make or break for USF Bulls coach Willie Taggart?

 
USF football coach Willie Taggart is headed into his third season.  {OCTAVIO JONES   |   Times}
USF football coach Willie Taggart is headed into his third season. {OCTAVIO JONES | Times}
Published Aug. 31, 2015

Taking the fourth

You can't peruse a college football preseason magazine without seeing Willie Taggart's name among coaches on the proverbial hot seat. Conventional thinking is that 2015 represents a bowl-or-bust season for USF's third-year coach. But if the Bulls fall narrowly shy of eligibility, here are four reasons Taggart should return in 2016:

Youth: The Bulls still might be a year away. Forty-seven players on the preseason roster are freshmen or redshirt freshmen.

Transfers: In less than a year, five prominent players have transferred from Power Five programs. Only one (OL Reilly Gibbons) is eligible now. The rest include 2016 projected starting QB Asiantii Woulard.

Finances: Dismiss Taggart after 2015 and USF would be paying three prominent former coaches (Stan Heath, basketball; Skip Holtz, football) not to coach through 2017. Not really practical for a Group of Five program already doling out significant bucks for cost of attendance.

Reboot: Fire Taggart and the rebuilding phase likely returns to Square One: new coach, new staff, new schemes and the inevitable exodus of players who don't click with the new regime.

Tom's terminology

Some of the positional terms used by new defensive coordinator Tom Allen, who has installed a 4-2-5 alignment:

Husky: Basically the nickel back; look for a converted safety (primarily Jamie Byrd) in this position

Stinger: The weakside linebacker in the 4-2-5

Rover: The strong safety

Bull: The weakside defensive lineman who often will fall back into coverage on a tailback or tight end; think of it as a linebacker who will put his hand in the dirt

By the numbers

0 Erroneous snaps by junior LS Alex Salvato in 2014.

165 Weight, in pounds, of Salvato, recently awarded a scholarship.

2 Players (WR Stanley Clerveaux, SS Hassan Childs) who tore ACLs in the preseason.

5 Receptions needed by senior Sean Price (56 catches) to eclipse USF's career record for tight ends.

7 USF opponents who played in bowl games last season.

22 Punts by Mattias Ciabatti downed inside the 20, most in the American Athletic Conference in 2014.

44.3 Combined career completion percentage of quarterbacks Steven Bench and Quinton Flowers.

Joey Knight, Times staff writer