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ESPN.com - NCF - Sources: Gophers pull new coach from NFL's Broncos

At first glance it appears as though Maturi and his trusty search firm dropped the ball on this hire. An NFL tight ends coach who nobody has heard of will do nothing to boost ticket sales or more importantly stadium fundraising efforts. Obviously Brewster and Maturi will be judged on victories, but a coach that excites the alumni and fan base would at least give you a short-term financial boost. Brewster will not give you said boost (although you may get a recruiting boost, more on that later).

Here are the positives to Brewster...

1. Coach Brewster has a son. This son plays QB. This QB is rated by ESPN as the 8th best QB in the country. Clint has verbally committed to Illinois, but my gut tells me that his dad won't let him go to a conference school. Clint immediately is the best recruit we have this year.
#45 overall in ESPN top 150
#8 QB
rating of 82 (Gophers current top rated player is 78 and nobody near the top 150)

2. The 2nd positive thing I can come up with Brewster is that you can type Brewster with only your left hand on the keyboard! That is sweet!

3. Brewster coached Antonio Gates. This might be more meaningless than #2 when it comes to the Gopher's program.

4. Brewster coached for 14 years in college, mostly under Mack Brown. Texas and North Carolina were his most recent stops and he has recruiting experience as he was the recruiting coordinator at UNC.

Here is who we DIDN'T hire...

1. Tony Dungy - This was always a longshot and moved to 1 in a 1,000,000 status with Indy's AFC /championship berth, but this would have been everything the Brewster hire is not. Tickets and alumni donations would instantly have gone up. EVERYTHING in their power should have been done to make Dungy happen if he had a remote interest.

2. Lane Kiffin - Offensive coordinator for a high powered offense that has dominated college football for several seasons. AND one of the most recognized college recruiters. Kiffin is from MN which is only important in that it may keep him here longer if he were to turn the program around. This is a springboard program at this point but maybe Kiffin would be inclined to raise his family in MN as he had stated. A proven recruiter and important assistant to the best college program this decade.

3. Gary Patterson - head coach at TCU. Patterson has head coaching experience and has been successful making a typical mid-level Div 1 program a recognizable name. TCU has won 11 games in 3 of the last 4 seasons beating high profile non-conference games including a win over #7 Oklahoma in 2005. Patterson also likely has recruiting relationships with high school coaches in the talent laden state of Texas.

All in all who knows if this will be a good hire or not. As stated my disgust is more that this is not the kind of big name hire that fans were drooling for. Brewster is a nobody as far as we are concerned and he has some work to do to inspire the fan base and make himself known to high school coaches and Gopher recruits.