The Washington State Cougars entered 2012 with high hopes following the hiring of Mike Leach. The return of the head coach to college football was supposed to bring the team a new flair, and while the exciting offense was certainly there at times, the success that followed was underwhelming to say the least.
The Houston Cougars went 13-1 last season, but big changes are coming in the 2012 season. Case Keenum is now in the NFL, and Kevin Sumlin now coaches for the Texas A&M Aggies. Tony Levine will take over a team that suffered major losses from last year’s team.
Mike Leach was bound to find another job sooner or later because of his past success, and it turns out the Washington State Cougars were the team to give him a chance. Leach left Texas Tech under tons of controversy, but he definitely took the Red Raiders program to far more success than they had ever seen before.
As weird as it sounds, more than two wins in 2011 will be an improvement for the Washington State Cougars who went just 2-10 overall and 1-5 in conference play last season. But it won’t get any easier with the newly realigned PAC-12 that puts them in the North with powerhouses Stanford and Oregon.
The 2010 season didn’t go at all how the Houston Cougars had expected. The team was nationally ranked going into the season, but injuries derailed the season after just two games.
After the conference shuffling in the Mountain West this past year, Brigham Young finds itself aligned with no one in a brave new world in 2011.
