Cooper V Kragthorpe
Which Was Worse?
I was checking my Twitter routinely yesterday as I always do and I seen an interesting tweet from @KVille85. It serves as the inspiration for today’s story,Thanks! The debate was basically that Ron Cooper was the worst coaching era in UofL football. I for one disagree immensely. It has absolutely nothing to do with the fact I played for Ron Cooper either. The 2 coaches were as different as 2 coaches could be also. Coop was one of the nicest guys (maybe his downfall) that had ever coached me. From talking to the players, Coach K was just a complete jerk to them and the polar opposite of Ron Cooper/ I’m gonna drop some knowledge on you and let you decide.
Ron Cooper:
Head Coach 1995-1997
| 1995 | Louisville | 7–4 | |||
| 1996 | Louisville | 5–6 | |||
| 1997 | Louisville | 1–10 | |||
| Louisville: | 13–20 | ||||
NFL guys Cooper coached:
David Akers 95,96
Rico Clark 95,96
Johnny Frost 95
Sam Madison 95,96
Tyrus McCloud 95,96
Roman Oben 95
Carl Powell 95,96
Ibn Green 96,97
Chris Redman 96,97
Terry Rice-Lockett 96, 97
Leland Taylor 96
Rashaad Holman 97
As you can tell by his last year, the 1-10 debacle, that he had less experienced talent and at the time, less talent. Coincidentally the 1-10 class ended up being one of the most heralded classes by the time they left and actually put Louisville back on the map. My opinion is that if Coop would have been given a chance he would have succeeded but we were ready to get him up out. lol
Steve Kragthorpe:
Head Coach 2007-09
| 2007 | Louisville | 6–6 | 3–4 | ||||
| 2008 | Louisville | 5–7 | 1–6 | ||||
| 2009 | Louisville | 4–8 | 1–6 | ||||
| Louisville: | 15–21 | 5–16 | |||||
NFL guys Krag coached:
Anthony Allen 07
Gary Barnidge 07
Brock Bolen 07,08
George Bussey 07,08
Harry Douglas 07
Breno Giacomini 07
Earl Heyman 07
Lamar Myles 07
Jonny Patrick 07,08,09
Eric Wood 07,08
Adrian Grady 07,08
Cam Graham 08,09
Greg Scruggs 08,09
Bilal Powell 09
We were not over .500 at all during the Kragtorpe Era. We came into his first season as a top 10 team and plummeted. I will say this. I have said from day one that Kragthorpe has been treated unfairly in the books of Louisville past. He came in knowing that he was cleaning out a bunch of guys and that he was gonna probably fail.
My argument wasn’t who was a better coach or that Krags wasn’t a good coach. Just which tenure was worse. Coop has one less loss, Krag has 2 more wins. Coop was independent and played really good teams, Krag played in the Big East at a low time quality wise for that conference. Coop had a winning season, Krag didn’t. Coopers teams led to what put UofL on the map again in football and Krag took us to a point of despair that we thought we could never pull ourselves out of. So it’s up to you to decide. My vote is that the Kragthorpe era was worse.
Go Cards!
