Every week during the Kent State football season, the radio broadcast led by Dane Richardson has the “Carney’s Corner” segment. Richardson interviews Kent State Interim Head Football Coach Mark Carney for their pre-game chat where they look back on the previous game and preview the game that day.
Carney’s corner, as those that are in his corner to become the long term coach at Kent State are growing weekly and daily. After Kent State’s 42-6 thumping of UMASS Saturday at Dix Stadium on Homecoming, many fans are ready to move on with Carney at the helm.
To understand Kent State’s turnaround this year so far, is to understand how disorganized, messy, sloppy, poor and leadership-less the Flashes looked the last two seasons.
Some of the turnaround this season can be measured by statistics. Some of it can be measured by using the eye test. And some of it can be measured by the words, actions and results of the young men on the team as well as the staff.
For sake of discussion, people, including myself, like to put numbers on what has to happen for Carney to be retained. Three overall wins, two league wins, and being competitive in four of the six league losses was a prediction I made.
After Saturday’s win, and studying the results of the impossible to predict MAC, who’s to say there aren’t more wins out there on the schedule as Kent State continues to improve and play together.
More so than what any number can measure, Carney is a leader. His players and staff follow him and want to perform for the program, and him.
It is clear to anyone paying attention, that Carney has been a breath of fresh air for the program. A genuine football leader, who players, fans and media have related to.
Resume wise, Carney checks a lot of the boxes in what the next Head Coach at Kent State should have. Previous coordinating experience, stops at multiple divisions of college football, and maybe most importantly, a Northeast Ohio native who knows the state as well as anybody.
Also, he wants to be at Kent State badly.
It’s early. And it’s important to weigh the body of work when forming decisions. But thus far, it’s easy to see that Carney is accumulating many more people in his corner.