Coach Rod on WTKA: DC, Philosophy

Michigan Coach Rich Rodriguez is scheduled to be on Sam Webb's WTKA morning show tomorrow (If Sam has any of his voice back). In the meantime, here are some things he said to John Bacon on the afternoon Big show ... mainly on the Defensive Coordinator search and coach Rod's defensive philosophy.

Coach Rodriguez:

"The process is very early right now. I've talked to some guys on the phone, gathering information on things. I've talked to guys on the current staff. I'm going to take time with it, not going to rush into what I want to do defensively. The coordinator is a concern whether it's in house or out of house, and I also want to make sure to leave all doors open. The national coaches convention is next week, there will be 5,000-plus coaches. I'll see guys there. There are still bowl games and NFL games to be played. I want to leave all options open for the for best fit not only for the University of Michigan, but for what we have our team, recruiting and our current staff."

On Defensive Philosophy:

"You can't just be a 3-4 guy or a 4-3 guy. At West Virginia we ran a 3-3-5 base, which was a little different. We'll maintain here the 4-3, 3-4 principle," he insisted. "We did a lot of 3-4 stuff in our second- and third-down packages this year, and we'll continue to do more four-man and odd fronts. I know what I want to do philosophically, but I don't want to change everything because of what we have on our team and what we've recruited so far. Our full-time defensive coaches, Jay Hopson, Tony Gibson and Bruce Tall ... I've coached with Bruce and Tony for several years, Jay this past year but I've known him for several years. All have been college coordinators, so they've got a lot of experience in the 4-3 and 3-4 packages. They get along great, they are good people and they are going to be involved in which direction we want to go."

And lastly, on the Spring Game:

"It looks like we'll be able to get a spring game in Michigan Stadium April 11th."