Why Mike Elko Will Win at Texas A&M

Brian there are football guys and then there are football guys so I'll put my in the first category that's been around the game his whole life from the standpoint of yeah playing all sorts of Sandlot ball and then playing in high school and knowing a little bit about the game and putting on a chin strap and knowing what it's like to pop some pads at least at that level and then that was the end of my talent the end of my career very abruptly so that was that I already knew that uh and then I've been around the game covering the game however there are football guys there are football guys that can watch the game and see things that I can't that I lean on to learn from from there I make deductions more than I can look at so for example I had a conversation earlier in the day about Miller Moss so I'm not the type that at times I will be able to look at a football game and make a talent evaluation and say h i I don't think that he's got it or he does or whatever but with a Miller Moss it's more from the standpoint of okay this was the recruiter appraisal and now he's in the hands of Lincoln Riley Lincoln Riley knows how to develop quarterbacks he's got a great system he calls plays about as well as anyone we know Miller Moss they they bypassed in the portal they didn't weren't desperate to go get somebody else to replace him look he had the one audition against a good Louisville defense look at what he did so the percentages tell me that Miller Moss should succeed because most of the evaluation is on the positive end from making mind to uctions it was not from me saying the ball looks really great coming out of his hand Mike Elco okay again do I know that he's making all the right coaching moves from watching every Duke game and figuring out okay he can really coach this team no it's more of a a deduction I came to because David Cliffs a really darn good football coach now he kind of lost his program late in his tenure and lost 15 out of 16 or 16 out of 17 ACC game hands the same roster over to Mike Elco and again don't have to be a a you know uh Football Genius to say this guy took the same roster with only one freshman recruiting class which isn't going to have much impact he goes nine and four and comes within a drive of going to the ACC Championship game and then he does it again The Following Season uh this is a darn good football coach so what's your evaluation of Elco and you again heard him talk today well you know I had a chance to kind of get to know Mike Elko when he was in Notre Dame back in 2017 and you talk about a history of overcoming bad situations he's the guy that had to rebuild Notre Dame's defense after the disaster that was Brian van gord's threee tenure Notre Dame and obviously that 2017 played pretty good defense 17 team played pretty good defense you talk about a guy walking into a situation Mark where they went 10 and 26 in the three years before he got there and then he comes out in his first year to go nine and and four and the thing I love about that nine and4 Mark is they did not lose a single game by more than a touchdown That season I mean they and and then they come out this this past season and they're 4- one their only loss being a last second sort of Miracle win by Notre Dame where they had to convert a fourth and 16 uh to win that game and then their quarterback gets hurt and and team like Duke's not in a position to replace a Riley Leonard so they were a very different team after Riley Leonard went down if Riley Leonard goes doesn't go down they're probably a nine- win team again and and we're talking about him just just having a much different perception I think it was a great hire by A&M he's a smart football coach he's a guy that's going to bring toughness they had very good defenses when he was there even the success I would argue that they had this past season had a lot to do with the recruiting that Mike kko did when he was the defensive coordinator at Texas A&M he he's someone who like look it's good to hire a good coach right that's important but it's it's so much better when you can hire a coach that understands the strengths and weaknesses of an institution in a program and so Mike ELO walks into college station and he walks into this techan program knowing this is what you can do to win here this is what the benefits we have we've got a great Brewster system in this regard we've got this we've got that we've got tradition but he also understands some of the the the uh stumbling blocks that that you can have to be successful and every program has them which is why Bama won Under Nick Sabin and one under Jean Stallings and one under Bear Bryant but didn't win when they had um coach Bill Curry they didn't win when they had Mike schula they didn't when they had uh what's the guy that got him on probation Mike theose right isn't that the guy that got him in control right those guys didn't win well why did all of a sudden bam as an institution not support football no because you have to do things a certain way you have to hire the right kind of coach that understands how to win there so looking at it from an A&M standpoint just big picture I think Mike Yoko was a tremendous higher and and not only is he a good football coach but he's a good guy he's a good dude I mean he's going to shoot you straight he's not a bser he's going to give you answers and you know one thing about texting him they may lose to knowre name on Saturday they may win we don't know but the one thing I'm confident in is they're going to compete and they may go seven and five this year they may go 10 and two I don't know what their record's going to be but what I'm confident in is that team is going to compete week after week after week because if you don't compete for Mike Elco he's going to find somebody else that will and that's one of the things that I that I I really respect him about as a coach is you know he's going to recruit a certain type of player and demand they go about their business a certain type of way they may not recruit the number one rank class like they did a couple years ago he's gonna find the right guys the the first thing that he did when he got hired at Notre Dame was hey we recruited this kid at wake force from Virginia nobody's really recruiting him it was us Virginia Michigan State kid by the name I don't know you might have heard of a Mark Jeremiah Wu coroa right he said we've got to get that kid to another name he knew EX exactly what Jeremiah could do brings him to Notre Dame and in the rest of History right like he's going to say I don't care if you're a fivar or three star if you can play if you have the right attitude the talent I'm gonna find you I'm gonna bring you here and it like I said it may not he's gonna Pro I think recruiting wise be more dbo than he was Jimbo where you know you may rank seventh or eighth because he's gonna find a couple gems like a Jeremiah wuor Mo for Notre Dame or a or an Isaiah Simmons for for Clemson when he was a three star out of Kansas and say but that kid's going to be a really good football player and he fits what we do and that's just one of the many reasons I think he's going to win there I I I don't think it's going to necessarily start this weekend but he's gonna win there I I have great deal of confidence he's gonna have success there Brian you touched on a stat that I ledged onto his first season at Duke that every time I was trying to explain how good I thought Mike ELO was at Duke uh was was the one score losses that you brought up because a lot of times you'll see a really good coaching job by somebody who takes over a three or four win team and kind of nurses them to seven and five but those five losses are ugly or four of them are ugly uh yeah all one- score losses and I still remember watching other what were more important games Across the Nation and seeing wow North Carolina Duke this is a one-score game there's about four minutes left and I flipped to the game Duke drives down the field they score what would have been the game-winning touchdown there's a really bad holding call at cheap chiny holding call that brings it back uh they lose to North Carolina as Drake May drives it down the other way and otherwise they're playing in the ACC Championship game in 2022 that's how good uh Mike ELO did with that particular team and of course they LED Florida State before Riley Leonard got hurt and went for it on fourth down um right in with the backup quarterback in the the Louisville game last year was the only one that really got out of hand because even the two losses they had down the stretch they lost by two points at North Carolina three points at Virginia they lost a notre aame by a touchdown in a game that they LED with less than a minute to go so you know you had those two games they tried to go with an injured Riley Leonard and those are the only two games that they got beat convincingly even when Riley got bench not benched but even when Riley got got knocked out for the year Duke was still competitive you know they weren't nearly as good of a team they barely beat a bad Wake Forest team you know they they beat a bad pit team had a nice win over Troy in the bowl game by a touchdown they they were a very different team when Riley went down but they still fought they were still competitive they still battled and that's what you're going to get from a Mike ELO coach football team that's how his defenses were at Bowling Green that's how they were at Wake Forest that's how they were at Notre Dame and that's how they're going to be that's how they were at Duke and that's exactly how they're going to be at Texas AA college football is even more exciting with some action on the line and the games are even better when you're cashing in and the voice of college football is the place to to be to get the greatest value let's start with my picks 75% against the money line 58% against the spread I've got a 40-year track record in fact in 2023 at $100 played per game you would have netted over $9,300 and guess what I'm just the warm-up act Steve Merrill our Ace in the Hole show stopper from wager talk 6 years with the voice of college football over 30 years in the industry Steve gives up analysis on all the big games but you can't miss Steve's weekly under the radar pick which went 21 and five against the spread the last two seasons I repeat 21 and five against the spread you also get picks from some of our top analysts here at the voice of college football including Steve da and Matt zik become a YouTube channel member or patreon member for just $99 per month go to the main Channel on YouTube click join and select the betting tier do the same thing on patreon make 2024 a winner now