Nielson Leaving?

sealhall74 · Thu Dec 10, 2015 4:48 pm

How freaking ironic is this? We have MVFC Coach of Year which put him in a position to be poached by the only team we rolled over in the conference play. He is not good enough to be on the national Coach of Year radar, yet SDSU's Stig is on it and Stig lost to Coach N in regular season final. Very bad Hollywood script here.

rocki · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:03 pm

Goyotes.net is saying it's official that Nielsen is their new head coach - supposedly somewhere on twitter.

Mizzou Rah · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:03 pm

Doesn't surprise me at all. Western's facilities are a joke and that won't change. I am sure coach Nielson went to ISU 2 times this year and saw how a true FCS program should aspire to be. As I understood Western told him there would be a new football only facility which isn't even close to happening. South Dakota obviously will give the commitment he wants. He has done a great job but to me it is more his staff (minus his Offensive coordinator) that has done the work. Western needs to be D2. You can blame this on the state budget which is probably legitimate but bottom line WIU will never be a consistent FCS program with the current budget for athletics. The home side is a bad joke, the press box is worse and the money spent on football is woefully short.

BobLovely · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:07 pm

If this rumor is true, it is very bad form and poor ethics to leave directly for a program in the same conference.

Bob

Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:17 pm

And to not even tell the players:
[tweet]675088441537875969[/tweet]

beauspencer · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:24 pm

My theory is WIU can't afford his contract.

Mizzou Rah · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:25 pm

As a parent, I thought Nielson was detached all year. My son was a 5th year senior, graduated early last December. His position coach came to the graduation. Nelson, not a word. Not a word from the coach all season. Nothing for the seniors except some chintzy picture that could have been done at CVS for $5. Players last year received a much nicer framed photo. Three 5 year seniors were told last March they would not be receiving their full 5th year scholarship, that scholarships would end in December 2015. Had the boys NOT graduated early they would have received full 5 years. Nelson did nothing to help them at all. 3 boys who committed themselves athletically and academically were not helped at all by this coach.

sealhall74 · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:26 pm

beauspencer wrote:My theory is WIU can't afford his contract.

That is one way to look at it. Blame Tommy Bell. The plot thickens.

meganeck · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:34 pm

rocki wrote:Seriously?

For the entire season we've seen posts about how Nielsen hasn't been the best fit, he's not ready for this level (still should be coaching DivII), and on and on. Now it looks like he might be moving on and all of a sudden it's the end of the world.

As for the university as a whole, Western isn't the only one struggling. Until IL gets its "stuff" together, every state school is going to suffer. We're just not aware of what is happening in other places (or at least I'm not privy to the economics of every school).

It's going to be rough, no doubt about it, but if we turn tail and run WE will have to face the fact that we were just fair weather fans/alumni in the end.

Just my random thoughts......

Rocki,
I agree I thought the same thing how they were complaining about him early this season and now are mad. I am disappointed in him leaving for a lateral job, but it sounds like WIU made promises that have been followed up on and South Dakota is in the midst of facility upgrades, so can't blame him I guess. If only Illinois had that oil money like the Dakotas have.

meganeck · Thu Dec 10, 2015 5:52 pm

ST_Lawson wrote:And to not even tell the players:
[tweet]675088441537875969[/tweet]

looks like a bunch of players are tweeting about finding out on Twitter