Troy Taylor to become Stanford's next head coach
A program that once was one of the elite programs out West has become a laughing stock of college football.
Stanford went from transcendent to out of touch so quickly the previous regime didn't even realize by the time it was too late. Coming off of their third losing season in the past four years, David Shaw decided it was finally time for him to step down as the head coach of the program.
By doing so after the final game of the season, he put the program in quite the predicament as they were forced to find a new coach in the midst of all of the transfer portal craziness with early signing day on the horizon. The Cardinal have lost 16 players to the portal, and their top two recruits as well. Not having a coach prevented them from being able to try and find transfers that could be potential fits to fill the huge holes they will have.
However, on Saturday following a 66-63 loss to Incarnate Word in the quarterfinals of the FCS Championship, it was announced that they finally have their guy to be the next head coach. Sacramento State's Troy Taylor, who has led the Hornets to a program record best 12 wins this season and a trip to the FCS Playoff. He leaves the program with a very impressive 30-8 record, winning nine games in the previous two seasons. The three winning consecutive seasons was a feat that hadn't happened at Sacramento State since they were a Division II program in 1984-86.
Taylor is quite familiar with Stanford, well, from an outside perspective. The new Cardinal head coach actually was a star quarterback at Cal before being drafted in the fourth round by the New York Jets. Outside of his head coaching experience with Sacramento State, he spent time as the offensive coordinator for Utah (2017-18), co-offensive coordinator at Eastern Washington (2016), and was also the head coach at Folsom High School from 2002 to 2015.
The new head coach brings a very forward thinking offensive mind that utilizes a lot of different looks than what Stanford fans are accustomed from seeing, who won't shy away from rebuilding this sinking program. When Taylor left his offensive-coordinator job at Utah in December 2018, to make less than half as much as the head coach of a struggling FCS team, the Hornets were fresh off an 0-7 record in conference play. Fans had stopped attending games, and the program had not won a Big Sky title in its 22 years in the league, causing some to flirt with the idea of Sacramento State be dropping football. They have now won three straight conference titles and have ascended top the top of the FCS level thanks to their high octane offense.
The hornets averaged 41 points this season, which ranked No. 4 in the FCS in scoring offense. They also ranked No. 6 in total offense, averaging 480 yards of offense a game with a strong top-40 passing attack complimented by a dominant run game that ranks No. 7 in rushing offense.
Taylor has consistently been viewed as one of the hot shot coaches coming out of the FCS rankings, it just had to be the right job for him to leave the job he loved so much.
Now, he will be tasked with rebuilding this Stanford program that badly wants to return to its former glory.
