Why This Week Matters

Kevin Lempa: a good one we let get way.


The next few days could very well be the most important test for new Head Coach Al Bagnoli's tenure at Columbia.

That's because Bagnoli will fill out his staff in the next 48 hours or so and it will be the staff of assistants who are most likely to give us an idea about just how quickly Columbia will begin to turn it around.

This is most critically the case with the coordinator positions.

The only 100% confirmed new hire we have so far is Jon Poppe from Harvard, but I have strong faith in the reports that Jon McLaughlin and Joe D'Orazio are joining the staff as well.

On the other hand, early reports that Yale's former Defensive Coordinator Rick Flanders and Union Head Coach John Audino are coming to Morningside Heights have failed to lead to any solid news yet.

But getting back to the importance of these hires, let's take a look at a few recent examples where good and bad coordinator hires really made an immediate impact on the Lions.

The most recent example was the hiring of Kevin Lempa as defensive coordinator by Pete Mangurian when Mangurian began his three years at Columbia in 2012. Lempa made the Lions defense a real force after a 2011 season when it underachieved despite great personnel like Josh Martin and Ryan Murphy. 

But for whatever reason, Lempa was out the door by 2013 and the team never recovered. It also never recovered from Mangurian's disastrous decision to hire Jaime Elizondo as the offensive coordinator. Columbia wasn't lucky enough to see Elizondo take a hike at any point under Mangurian. He stated all three years and oversaw an offense that was much more than inept, it was the football equivalent of an EPA Superfund site. "Toxic" doesn't even begin to describe it.

Under Norries Wilson, offensive coordinator Vinny Marino also stayed for his head coach's entire six-year term. This too was disastrous for many reasons, not the least of which was the lack of respect the players had for him.

On the other side, the very experienced and effective Defensive Coordinator Lou Ferari left Wilson's staff unexpectedly close to the beginning of the 2008 season. His loss hurt the team as he had energized the players nicely in 2006 and did his best to stop the bleeding during a very disappointing 2007.

There are more examples, but the key is this: Bagnoli looks like he's going to bring some very experienced and well-known successful coaches to his senior staff at Columbia. Most of the time when we hear about new assistant coaching hires, our first question is "who?" And then we find out they hail from colleges we've never heard in conferences and divisions we've never heard of.

With the new commitment from President Lee Bollinger to boost assistant coach pay and Bagnoli's proven ability to attract and keep top assistants, Columbia could go from having the worst and least experienced coaching staff to the best and most experienced in the league.