Willingham Fired - again!

So it happened. the University of Washington announced that Ty Willingham was fired as head coach effective at the end of the season. This has almost a poetic aura around it. Let's play TyLibs, my own take on the futility of Willingham.

2004
Willingham is driving Notre Dame into the abyss of college football relevance. A 6-5 season was punctuated by yet another blowout loss to USC. Recruiting efforts were at an all-time nadir, with little hope on the horizon. The week following that loss, ND announced his firing prior to completion of his 5 year contract. The AD, Kevin White, said at his press conference, "We simply have not made the progress on the field that we need to make. From Sunday through Friday our football program has exceeded all expectations, in every way, but on Saturday, we struggled. We've been up and down and sideways a little bit." Willingham is obviously upset about the decision, and refuses to resign. He then proceeds to move on and collect $1.3 million from Notre Dame to buyout his contract.

2008
Willingham is driving Washington into the abyss of college football relevance. An 0-7 season was punctuated by yet another blowout loss to Notre Dame. Recruiting efforts were at an all-time nadir, with little hope on the horizon. The week following that loss, UW announced his firing prior to completion of his 5 year contract. The AD, Scott Woodward, said at his press conference, "It became quite obvious with the performance on the football field it wasn't up to what we talked about at the beginning of the season and previous to the season. It became more obvious as time went on this season." Willingham is obviously upset about the decision, and refuses to resign. He then proceeds to move on and collect $1 million from Washington to buyout his contract.

It is so gratifying that we were the team to put the nail in the coffin on his tenure at Washington. Don't forget he was talking to UW about a contract before he was let go. Furthermore, ND was called everything from inpatient, disloyal, a dead program to racist following the firing. I'm sorry, but after the unfair attacks on ND when he was fired, and his quiet affirmation of claims ND was racist, I admit I hold a grudge. I am glad we were the team to send him out! I think Husky fans are happy about this outcome as well!

Last year, many were comparing Weis to Willingham, and outsiders laughed when we tried to shift some of the blame for 2007 to Willingham's poor recruiting. I think as people look closely at UW's program today, they are silently reconsidering all the unfair statements they made about ND firing Willingham back in 2004. Will Notre Dame get the apologies they deserve from Mark May, Ivan Maisel, John Saunders, Dennis Dodd, Jason Whitlock and a myriad of other media personalities? (That's right, I saved the links to hear what they had to say back in 2004. It is laughable!!!) I seriously doubt it, but 2008 finally provides closure for me to the Willingham era.