Turnover Analysis: Big 12

Just so you know, it bothers me to no end that the conference demands all publication of its name be in numerals.  I always want to write Big Twelve---it's a visual thing.  Not my call, however.

Anyway.

Part three of seven, below: 

Baylor

(+3,-5,-9,-3,-17,-5,-15,+5) Grand total: -46

Did you know Baylor's only 10-win season was under Grant Teaff in 1980? Dave Roberts owns that +3 mark for his final season in Waco, a 2-9 effort.  Kevin Steele coached the next four seasons never gaining more than three wins, and the ever-patient Guy Morriss has been in charge the last three.  Morris has been all over the map with the turnovers in his three years, but they did manage +5 last year, good enough to give Baylor a 5-6 record.  It is the program's best win total since the Chuck Reedy era of 1993-1996 that netted the program 5,7,7 and 4 wins.

Check out these Points For/Points Allowed totals during the Morriss regime, looks like a guy acclimating to the job:

2003: 191/455
2004: 224/406
2005: 236/291

PF going up, PA going down, love it.

Colorado

(+6,+5,+5,-2,+7,-6,+1,+2) Grand total: +18

The first total is credited to Rick Neuheisel's final year in Boulder before Gary Barnett moved in and held the head coach position the next seven years.  It's a quality eight-year run in the turnover margin department.  Nothing fancy, but any team that can half its seasons in the +7,+6,+5,+5 range is doing pretty well.  Amazingly, the -2 season was Barnett's best, as Colorado went 10-3.  Not surprisingly, the -6 return was paired with Barnett's only losing season, a 5-7 effort.

Iowa State

(-9,-10,+5,+13,-1,-6,+10,+14) Grand total: +16

Dan McCarney's been the head coach at Iowa State since the 1995 season, so blame him for any and all of the good and bad in this eight-year period.  Prior to this eight-year run, McCarney inherited a team that went 0-10-1.  He had a rough start, winning 3,2 and 1 games his first three years, and then netted just 3 and 4 wins the next two seasons before he truly turned things around in 2000 with a 9-3 effort.  Not surprisingly, the Cyclones had a +13 turnover margin that year.  Two more negative turnover seasons saw the record plumment to 7-5 and 7-7 before he fixed the turnover numbers with two more double-digit positive outputs at +10 and +14.  Those corresponded with a pair of 7-5 records.

McCarney's last six years have been a drastic improvement from the effort earlier in his career and much of that credit is due to dramatically improving the turnover numbers.

Kansas

(-2,+1,-6,-8,-9,-7,+4,-8) Grand total: -35

Terry Allen owns the first four totals, Mark Mangino the last four.  Disaster abounds.  It's hard to find any correlations here, as Kansas won 4,5,4 and 3 games in Allen's final four seasons.  Mangino battled his way to 6 wins with a -7 turnover margin, then boosted the margin to +4 the next season and yet the record fell to 4-7.  Then, Kansas produces a sloppy -8 last year but finish 7-5, the program's best record since the 10-2 record in 1995 under Glen Mason.  Next...

Kansas State

(+13,+18,+7,-1,+9,-1,-6,-6) Grand total: +33

This is all Bill Snyder, who stepped down at the end of last season.  Kansas State has built a reputation as a ball-hawking school but the wheels came off Snyder's final three seasons.  However, you'll be hard pressed to find a better five-year turnover run as the one from 1998 to 2002.  In that time period, Kansas State had four 11-win seasons, interrupted only by a 6-6 record in 2001 (-1 turnover margin).  Bill Snyder clearly understood turnovers, and when he could no longer control them stepped down.

Missouri

(+8,-9,-5,-1,+12,+11,+5,-1) Grand total: +20

Larry Smith owns the first three totals, Gary Pinkel the last five.  Not surprisingly, Smith's 8-4 record matches the +8 effort in 1998.  He then went 3-8 and 4-7, mirrored by -9 and -5 turnover efforts.  Gary Pinkel's greatly improved Mizzou's turnover fate, notching two double-digit positive seasons, and finishing no worse than -1 twice.  However, Missouri's record has been uninspiring.  Pinkel's best season was 2003 at 8-5 and +11.

Nebraska

(+8,+6,+1,-1,-3,+23,-13,-2) Grand total: +19

Frank Solich owns the first six marks, Bill Callahan the last two.  Nothing fancy here, just a bunch of 10-win seasons mostly with an option offense and talented defense.  The +23 total is amazing, and was matched with a 10-3 record, Solich's final in Lincoln.  It's hard to judge Callahan's turnover skills right now but it'd be in his interest to notch a positive return somewhere.

Oklahoma

(-6,-6,+7,+9,+19,+17,+4,-1) Grand total: +43

This is one of the easiest to interpret.  The disastrous John Blake owns the first mark, then Oklahoma hired defensive guru Bob Stoops, who held the line for a season and remade the program in his image and improved the record to 7-5.  Then, Oklahoma went on to dominate much of the early 2000's, winning a national championship in 2000 at +7.  That was followed up by +9,+19 and +17 seasons with 11,12 and 12 wins.  Things began to decline in 2005.  Oklahoma made the Orange Bowl but was routed and had just a +4 return that season.  Last year Oklahoma had to replace Jason White and much of its defense and struggled to a -1 mark in the most disappointing season in Norman since Stoops was hired.  Stoops understands turnovers so I have faith that Oklahoma will return to previous levels soon.

Oklahoma State

(+4,-5,-4,-8,-2,-4,+16,-15) Grand total: -18

Eight years, three coaches.  Oy.  Bob Simmons owns the first three totals (5-6,5-6 and 3-8 records), Les Miles owns the next four and Mike Gundy owns the last one.  Miles had one bad season (4-7 record/-8 turnover margin) and three good ones (8-5/-2, 9-4/-4, 7-5/+16).  Gundy's first effort was disastrous and the Cowboys were the embarrassment of the Big 12.  We'll see where he goes from here.

Texas

(-1,+13,+5,+10,+17,+2,+5,+7) Grand total: +58

Eight years, all with Mack Brown.  Easy enough.  He inherited the program from John Mackovic and started off with three straight 9-win seasons.  Brown then made a leap and started winning 10 and 11 games from that point onward, peaking with last season's 13-0 national championship.  Brown clearly understands the importance of turnovers and how to control them, but has let the numbers dip just a hair the last few seasons.

Texas A&M

(+15,0,+5,+8,+2,-11,+9,+5) Grand total: +33

Defensive-minded R.C. Slocum owns the first five marks, Dennis Franchione the final three.  Slocum's 11-win 1998 season mirrored his team's +15 turnover total.  Franchione won just 4 games his first year (-11), then notched 7 wins (+9) and then 5 wins (-5).  Pretty self-explanatory.

Texas Tech

(-6,-2,+6,+6,-10,-8,-5,+9) Grand total: -10

Spike Dykes owns the first two marks, Mike Leach the final six.  Here are Texas Tech's win totals in that eight year time frame: 7,6,7,7,9,8,8,9.  Hard to tell what's going on.  Leach is considered an offensive coach and may not worry intensely about the possession game when he's directing a high-octane offense that scores upwards of 70 touchdowns a season.

***
Previous:

• Turnover Analysis: SEC
• Turnover Analysis: ACC
• Turnover Data
  

Comments

[Stephen Kim]

It's hard for me to think that Baylor was very close to having a winning record last year.

Slowly but surely, Baylor will be a decent program. I'd probably say it'd be similar to Mizzou. Some years 8 wins here and there, mixed with 4-5 win years.