I'm a "data/numbers" person, so I was thinking, are there any hard numbers we can use to test the "CU is harder to win at than other universities" hypothesis?
It struck me that what we could do is look at the past 7 or 8 coaches we've had, and see which ones have coached at other schools. Then compare their records at CU vs their records elsewhere. If CU is uniquely harder to win at than other schools, then one would expect coaches to have worse records at CU than they had at other institutions. If they don't, well...
Three of the past 8 coaches were not head coaches any other school besides CU (Embree, McCartney & Crowder), so they aren't useful for this exercise, but the other 5 all have records at schools other than CU:
So, of the coaches who also coached at other BCS schools, three of the four had better records at CU than they did at their other coaching stops. When you include non-BCS coaching stops, three of five had better records at CU than they did elsewhere.
There's no pattern here. Some coaches do better here than they do elsewhere. Some do better elsewhere than they do here.
IF CU has "unique circumstances" that make it difficult to win here, there would be a pattern.
There isn't.
Stuff it.
It struck me that what we could do is look at the past 7 or 8 coaches we've had, and see which ones have coached at other schools. Then compare their records at CU vs their records elsewhere. If CU is uniquely harder to win at than other schools, then one would expect coaches to have worse records at CU than they had at other institutions. If they don't, well...
Three of the past 8 coaches were not head coaches any other school besides CU (Embree, McCartney & Crowder), so they aren't useful for this exercise, but the other 5 all have records at schools other than CU:
| CU Record | % | Non-CU BCS Record | % | Non-BCS Record | % | |
| Hawkins | 19-39 | 33% | 53-11 | 83% | ||
| Barnett | 49-38 | 56% | 35-45 | 44% | 8-11-1 | 44% |
| Neuheisel | 36-14 | 70% | 54-45 | 55% | ||
| Fairbanks | 7-26 | 21% | 52-15-1 | 78% | ||
| Mallory | 35-21-1 | 63% | 69-77-3 | 48% | 64-31 | 67% |
So, of the coaches who also coached at other BCS schools, three of the four had better records at CU than they did at their other coaching stops. When you include non-BCS coaching stops, three of five had better records at CU than they did elsewhere.
There's no pattern here. Some coaches do better here than they do elsewhere. Some do better elsewhere than they do here.
IF CU has "unique circumstances" that make it difficult to win here, there would be a pattern.
There isn't.
Stuff it.