Ken Wilson (Photo: Nevada Athletics)
We didn’t think Doug Knuth had it in him. We did not believe the Nevada Wolf Pack athletic director had the guts to turn his football program back over to Chris Ault.
Yes, of course, Ken Wilson will be on the sidelines during games, running practices during the week, tossing mind-numbing clichés at the media and boosters and earning roughly $1 million a year as the new head coach. But Knuth and Ault made it very clear last week that Wilson is the newest Pack coach because that is what Ault wanted.
The hiring of Wilson is all the proof you need that Ault is, without question, pulling the Pack football strings once again. Ault is now 75 years old. The last thing someone born during the Truman presidency wants is to coach a bunch of 18-22-year-olds who are looking for the most lucrative Name, Image and Likeness deal. Do you think Ault really wanted to sit on a plane to Hawaii, let alone a bus to Fresno or San Jose State? So Knuth did the next best thing by hiring Ault’s doppelganger.
It was Ault who convinced Knuth last week to hire Wilson. It was Ault who convinced Knuth to not consider anyone but Ken Wilson. It was Ault who convinced Knuth to hire Wilson faster than you can say, “do the right thing, Dougie.” And Dougie did as he was told.
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Knuth, it is now obvious, was stunned by Jay Norvell’s lateral move to Colorado State. He was obviously hurt, betrayed and, at least, professionally angry about his disloyal head coach going to another team in the Mountain West. Norvell embarrassed Knuth in front of his Mountain West athletic director buddies. Ault, who did nothing but support Norvell and sing his praises for five years, was equally hurt, betrayed and stunned by Norvell.
“It really bothered me,” Ault said.
So an angry, betrayed and disappointed Knuth and Ault teamed up last week. It was like The Donald and Barack teaming up to pick the next president. But this hiring was personal for Knuth and Ault. When someone you trusted betrays you for all the world to see, well, it is always personal. That’s why Knuth and Ault hired the anti-Norvell last week. They hired someone who will never betray them, the university or Wolf Pack football.
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This was a brilliant hire by Knuth. First of all, if Wilson never wins a game as Pack coach, it won’t be Knuth’s fault. Wilson is who Ault wanted. Wilson is who Pack fans, who don’t know Instagram from instant coffee and are proud of it, wanted. So Knuth, who has made a career out of hiring carpetbagger coaches at Nevada, gave them what they wanted. Wilson was Knuth’s way of giving the Pack football program back to Pack fans because Knuth knows as well as anyone that he needs those fans to save the program.
Never forget that Knuth is, above all else, a bottom line guy. Hiring Wilson is his way telling Pack fans to fix the Pack’s bottom line. Have you noticed all the empty seats at Mackay Stadium the last seven, eight years? Hiring Wilson is Knuth’s way of finally telling the boosters, “OK, I’m listening to you and giving you what you want. You love Chris Ault? You still go to bed at night dreaming of that win over Boise State in 2010? Well, here is the next best thing. Now put your money where you mouth is and go buy tickets.”
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The past nine seasons of carpetbagger football under Brian Polian and Jay Norvell is thankfully over. Oh, it wasn’t all bad. It was interesting the first hundred or so times to hear about all of those Buffalo Bills, Al Davis and Peyton Manning stories. And the change of clichés from Nevada Back and Nevadatude to Nevada Grit and Keep Chopping was, at least, different.
Polian and Norvell did bring a ton of great players to Nevada, even if they didn’t always know what to do with them. But Polian and Norvell never truly embraced Nevada. And Pack fans knew that better than anyone. So they stayed away for the most part. This was just Stepping Stone University for Polian and Norvell.
Polian seemed to noticeably cringe when words that even sounded like “Chris Ault” came out of his mouth. Norvell, to his credit, voiced his respect for Ault many times and especially during Fremont Cannon Week. But it had all the sincerity of a politician kissing a baby. Well, those days are over. Chris Ault Field is no longer just some random paint on some plastic grass in the middle of Mackay Stadium, the House that Chris Ault Built. It is, once again, an attitude up on North Virginia Street. Yes, a Nevadatude. This is your team, once again, Northern Nevada. Now go support it.
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Will Wilson win a Mountain West championship at Nevada? Will he get the Pack into the Top 25 and turn it into the next Cincinnati? Was he truly the best choice as the next Pack coach? Nobody really knows the answers to those questions.
Wilson, it seems, was never on anyone’s list of head coaching candidates. He just always seemed to be nothing more than a loyal, hard-working, friendly, coaching lifer, content to be someone’s assistant. Is he the best coach the Pack could have hired? Well, when Ault fired Chris Tormey after the 2003 season and took his job as Pack head coach, he said, “I’m sure there are better coaches in the country. But there is nobody better for the Nevada job.” That seems to apply to Wilson now.
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Wilson’s biggest hurdle at Nevada, though, just might be separating himself from Ault. Being Ault’s pseudo son is why he got the job and Wilson freely admits it. But it also might be the worst thing about actually getting the job. Wilson, who worked for Ault for a quarter century at Nevada, will always be loyal to Ault. He loves the man and should get a silver and blue heart for working for Ault so long.
But working for Ault and helping make him look good is not the same as trying to find your own spotlight as head coach. Just ask Jeff Tisdel and Jeff Horton. The challenge of working in Ault’s shadow basically destroyed Tisdel and Ault finally had to put him out of his misery after the 1999 season. Horton hated the ever-present Ault so much in 1993 that he ran screaming into the night to UNLV after just one year as head coach.
This Wilson hiring, make no mistake, has all the feel of the Tisdel and Horton hires. Tisdel and Horton were never considered anything more than Ault puppets and it clearly affected them as head coach. Wilson has the benefit of not having Ault as his athletic director, though the events of last week have certainly made that distinction a bit cloudy. Will Wilson be able to deal with the Ault shadow?
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Ault just can’t seem to move on. He has been retired for nine seasons and he is in the Wolf Pack and College Football Hall of Fame. He will likely always be the Wolf Pack’s all-time winningest coach. He gave the world Colin Kaepernick and the pistol offense. He even built his own monument (Legacy Hall) on campus.
The Wilson hiring, though, reminded us that Ault is still hovering over the program. It has brought back a lot of concerns we thought disappeared in 2012. Don’t forget Ault took over the program for the second and third times in 1993 and 2003 just as quickly as Wilson got the job last week. And Ault orchestrated it last week just like he orchestrated it back in 1993 and 2003. Ault disappeared during the Brian Polian era (2013-16) because his feelings were hurt. The university didn’t allow him to have any input in the hiring and Polian made it very clear he didn’t want Ault anywhere near the program. So Ault pouted and stayed away.
He came back about five minutes after Polian was fired, even showing up at Norvell’s introductory press conference. He then spent the next five years going to practices, chumming up to Norvell and giving the team pep talks. Why didn’t Ault just sit back last week and let Knuth make the hire at his own pace? If you don’t know the answer to that question, you don’t know Ault. This, he believes, is still his football program. Ault will no doubt inch his way even closer to the program now that Wilson is the head coach. Is this healthy for Wolf Pack football? Is it healthy for Wilson?
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