Looking back at the 2016 season (the greatest “what if” in UH football G5 history)

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  1. Tony Levine leverages the Big East and lands future NFL recruits
  2. Big East falls, Levine gets eventually fired
  3. Herman is hired and inherits Levine’s master recruiting class
  4. Herman and Greg Ward wins the 2015 AAC and a Peach Bowl win over FSU
  5. Herman recruits one of the best classes in UH history for 2016 such as Ed Oliver, D’Eriq King, Marquez Stevenson (and Kyle Allen if you want to add the caliber)
  6. Continuing from point 5, Herman manages to snag Ed Oliver over schools like LSU and Alabama by hiring Ed’s high school coach. Also helps Marcus Oliver (Ed’s brother) was already on the team
  7. Houston manages to snag what is arguably one of the greatest schedules in UH history as a G5 (Oklahoma ranked #3, and by the end of the season, Louisville was ranked #5)

Of course, right after that OU win on national TV to open the season opening weekend, Herman immediately starts shopping for his next job.

Perhaps injuries a partially to blame for the Navy/SMU losses (also around the time the Herman-LSU rumors began), but 2016 was THE season for UH. Literally everything aligned for UH to get an actual DESERVED playoff bid as a G5.

The biggest waste of a season ever, and also the biggest What Ifs in our program’s history.

How we managed to pull together that roster full of future NFL talent from prior staffs as well as family ties. How we luckily had two TOP 5 teams on the schedule planned years prior.

It still hurts me to this day. The 2016 season felt more like a P5 season than the entirety of our inaugural Big 12 season last year even with Texas on the schedule.

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Get over it, hurts you, wow nothing compares to losing the 1983 championship game to NC State on a last second throw down, yes we had a good football season that year and Herman shafted us but move on

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This is exactly backwards. Levine recruited Marcus. Big Ed’s father made it clear that Ed would go where Marcus was. Herman inherited Marcus (and therefore Ed) from Levine.

Herman deserves the credit for King, etc., but he never demonstrated the ability to recruit linemen (offensive or defensive) while at UH.

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Derek verbally committed summer of 2015 and this season sealed the deal for him. He said the OU and Louisville games were the most exciting games he’s ever attended.

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From what I recall, King was committed or at least intended to go to TCU. However, TCU recruited him as an athlete and not a QB.

He committed to UH expecting to be a QB as soon as Ward graduated. He played the slot in the meantime

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I thought the 2011 season was the bigger waste. We win that game against Southern Miss and we have a puncher’s chance at that title game. The country really did not want to see LSU play Alabama again. And we’d have had a puncher’s chance against LSU too. Their offense was atrocious.

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I agree. Folks blame Herman, but I’d say we simply ran out of gas. OU drained us, then we went on the road against tough Cincy team. Brutal.

I think by the time we got to Navy, we were running on fumes. We barely escaped Tulsa.

SMU was heavy legs. You could see it , guys dragging coming on to the field. We lacked depth.

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Yeah, still stinks to think about what mightve been if we had kept our focus. A darn good team.

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I doubt we ran out of gas after OU but it’s just my opinion.

Generally , I think if we kept sumlin and Herman those yrs without them looking around we’d have been in the playoffs and 1 big bowl. I think we could have played Michigan in the sugar bowl one the 2 times but I forget. It would have been epic.

They really need to make a rule saying no coaches or players can leave or opt out until after the bowls etc are all played. Then we have truth about team strength from that yr.

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2016 had the most potential but man 2011 Southern Miss game cost us Sugar Bowl. That one still hurts.

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