TCU’s Gary Patterson AP Coach of the Year – NCAA College Football

Breaking down why TCU’s Gary Patterson deserves his AP Coach of the Year Award… and why his most distinguishing move occurred off the field.

Well-Deserved Recognition

Another BCS-busting first for the Horned Frogs of TCU–Gary Patterson has been named the first non-BCS conference Coach of the Year by the Associated Press.

The irony of that being the case is that any extremely successful non-BCS conference coach has to workfar harder than his BCS counterparts. Regardless of their coaches’ recruiting skills, the big name schools will always draw in higher-ranked classes by virtue of the name of the university itself.

The coach of a less famous school needs to be twice as inspiring to potential recruits and do far more with less in the way of talent. Sure, the intra-conference competition may not measure up to that of the BCS leagues, but to receive national recognition, those coaches must schedule as many BCS schools for inter-conference play as possible, so it’s not as if they play nobody. And in the case of the Mountain West Conference, the powerful triumvirate of Utah, BYU and TCU negates even that argument.

Here are some of Patterson’s accomplishments this year:

• TCU’s first Mountain West Conference title.
• TCU’s first BCS bowl.
• Highest ranking ever for a non-BCS conference school.
• TCU is the only team ranked in the Top 6 for both total offense and total defense.

And since he took the helm of the Horned Frogs nine years ago, Patterson has led TCU to five 11+ wins seasons in the last seven years amidst an 85-27 overall record.

A well-deserved award? Absolutely.

Without a doubt, there is a lot to applaud in regards to what Patterson has done with the TCU program. But you know what I like most? He didn’t pull a Brian Kelly and immediately jump ship to a larger program. It seems that every time a non-major program has a great season, that team’s coach is poached by a bigger school, lured by more money and more prestige. But when Patterson’s name was reportedly in the running for the Notre Dame job, he quickly squelched any rumors of defection by signing an extension with Texas Christian through 2016. Loyalty is vastly underrated these days.

Gary Patterson = class act.

• December 18, 2009 -- 2009 NCAA College Football Bowl Picks (0)
• December 8, 2009 -- Bowl Challenges Set (0)
• November 17, 2009 -- As The Season Dwindles Down… (0)
• November 3, 2009 -- Iowa’s Pass (0)
• October 26, 2009 -- Statement Game (0)