Shannon's ties to Wannstedt run deep

Randy Shannon has had a lot of teachers throughout his life. But none know him better than the guy who will be coaching against him Thursday night.

"Randy and I go way back," Pittsburgh coach Dave Wannstedt said during Monday's Big East Teleconference. "I've probably been involved with his football life most of his life."

Wannstedt isn't kidding. As the linebackers coach and defensive coordinator at Miami under coach Jimmy Johnson, Wannstedt was involved in recruiting Shannon out of Miami Norland High and coaching him with the Canes. When it was time for Shannon to go the pros, Wannstedt was in Dallas with JJ when the Cowboys used their final pick in the 1981 draft to take Shannon. When Shannon's playing career was done, Wannstedt hired him to be the Dolphins linebackers coach.

"When you hire coaches you want people that No. 1 are very knowledgeable particularly about what you want to do defensively. Randy is very smart that way," Wannstedt said. "You want to hire people you know as people, you know their work ethic, you know what they stand for. And people that you trust so when you get to those tough parts of the season people as you always do, you want to surround yourself around people that are loyal."

Shanoon been loyal to the Canes since leaving the Dolphins. And when he became head coach four years ago, he once again went to Wannstedt for assistance.

"I asked him to come up and spend some time [two days] with some of our defensive coaches. They talked about some of the things they were doing on defense and it was a great exchange," Wannstedt said. "We talked a little bit about certain things that come up with head coaching and hiring people. There were no specific topics that we sat down and talked about. Me knowing the culture at Miami and having coached there, we were able to have a real good conversation. Heck we talked about ex-players, from their involvement to spring practice. We kind of just talked back and forth on a lot of topics."

There's no telling how much Wannstedt's familiarity with Shannon will really help or hurt the Hurricanes Thursday night. But the Panthers, picked by many to win the Big East this year, will be no pushover. Shannon said Sunday he expects a physical battle.

"Knowing Dave Wannstedt for a long time - him being my coach and working with him at the Dolphins, I've spent a lot of time with him. He wants to be a physical, tough team that will bend but don't break defense," Shannon said.

"It's going to be an exciting game, two teams that are 1-1 and looking for an opportunity to get better on both sides of the football and also on special teams. The Pitt offense, they have a 1-2 punch running the football that will be key to this game. They have a big-time receiver that makes a lot of plays for them, is their go-to guy. Defensively they play together as a group. They may not have any superstars, but they line up in a 4-3 scheme and play sound. It's going to be fun to see what happens Thursday night."

A few more tidbits from practice...

> While tackling has been a huge emphasis this week in practice, creating turnovers -- particularly hanging onto interceptions -- haven't been far behind.

"That's probably one of the biggest things we've worked on this week," senior cornerback Ryan Hill said. "Striking the ball carrier, stripping the ball, intercepting the ball. I think coach Shannon, he's out there throwing balls after every play to the cornerback.

"It's kind of funny but we're doing everything we have to do to make sure we catch the ball. I saw him out there today throwing the ball to Demarcus Van Dyke. I was like what is he doing? But I like when coach Shannon does stuff like that. It's having fun. But it's also making us work and making us think about creating turnovers at the same time."

> Pittsburgh quarterback Tino Sunseri has only made two starts in his career, but he's thrown for 459 yards with three touchdowns and two interceptions while completing 65 percent of his passes.

"He is doing a great job for them,'' Shannon said Tuesday. "He is not turning the ball over a lot and doing a lot of good things just managing the offense. They have two great receivers that they are going to throw the ball to and they have a great running back. We know we have to come out and control the run game and make sure that those big guys don't get big plays.''

> A big key for the Canes secondary will be covering receiver Jon Baldwin, who at 6-5, 230 pounds will have a rather large size advantage against UM's corners. In just over two seasons, Baldwin has 15 catches of 40 yards or more -- including nine that have gone for touchdowns.

"That's the matchup you want,'' Hill said Monday. "If he's the go-to guy, that's who you want. You can kind of make a name for yourself covering a receiver like that. You look at Randy Moss and Darrelle Revis yesterday. You want that challenge if you're a corner. Obviously, we have a challenge in front of ourselves.''

> Heinz Field is notorious for having some of the worst wind conditions of any stadium in the NFL. Shannon said Monday it will be up to special teams coach Joe Pannunzio and kicker Matt Bosher to determine which way they want to kick.

"You just wait until game time because the wind does swirl with that stadium and Giants Stadium is like that,'' Shannon said. îîSometimes the Dolphins' stadium swirls a little bit, you have to figure out what type of wind it is each day."

> On the injury front, Shannon said defensive end Marcus Robinson and defensive tackle Luther Robinson both practiced Monday. We just aren't sure to what extent. I saw Marcus Robinson limping off the field and with a brace on his right ankle after practice.

Comments

[Nonsense I tell U!]

John Brantley = 3 games played against UNRANKED teams.

Jacory Harris = 2 games played, one against #2 in the nation.

Looks like Kentucky is going to finally get that win!

GO WILDCATS!!!

[Meyer can't coach, it was his OC and DC that left!]

USF was hard enough for the entire team of swamp lizards to handle.

ROLL TIDE!!!

[Meyer can't coach, it was his OC and DC that left!]

Heck, the Redhawks were hard enough for the entire swamp lizards to handle.

I've never heard of an undefeated team falling 5 spots in the rankings. Only at UFluke. They really suck!

30 arrests finally getting the national attention it deserves. Here comes the NCAA...

Oh, and ROLL TIDE!!!

[Canes Outplaying Gators]

Folks, as you can see from the posts above, the racist Gator troll is back in action, impersonating Canes fans and even impersonating our school President. All efforts at getting a truce with this obsessed sicko have failed, because he would rather attack people from a safe distance behind his keyboard and his impersonated names than to discuss football.

Now, we USED TO react to this guy on here, and it got difficult to read when we couldn't be sure that the comment was from a cane fan or this imposter. Until such time as he is banned, we needd to do like America did against Japan and against Afghanistan. Do NOT respond to his racism and homophobia on here, but retaliate on his own board, Gator Clause. It has worked to get him off the Sun Sentinel board as he went so far as to threaten to lynch our head coach, leading to him getting banned. Retaliation will hopefully work here as well. You can already see how desperate and disgusting he is being, I am sure that Manny or Susan will get their IT people to clear him from here as well.

So, retaliate there, not here.

[CW]

Which Robinson was limping? It's not clear.

[We just want to make you happy!]

In psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud defined hate as an ego state that wishes to destroy the source of its unhappiness.

THE U is the source, but why?

[Canesjunkie]

Two guys he can't coach sharing info? I think I'll find something else to do Thursday nite.

[Canes Outplaying Gators]

In the meantime, if Manny or Susan can clean up the garbage on here from the fake IDs above, it sure would help.

Folks, wait until they are gone to reply, they will just steal your ID and get you to fight with each other.

PS: Expect a fake message from my ID soon, it is what the obsessed Curse Piggy does best.

[Acting like we finished the season 1-11, geez!]

When three scholarship QB's, regardless of their ability to start, transferred he Shannon effectively wrecked things. Yes, it IS his fault.

Posted by: 1cane | September 20, 2010 at 01:58 PM

Ok, and Cook and Smith are doing what for what schools currently?

Smith can't even start at Memphis and took two QBs going down for him to even get in. Cook is sharing duties at another school meaning he hasn't secured a spot there either. We talking 'bout Rice, man!

What is really wrecked though? Losing to the #2 team in the country at their house, and it being only the second game of the season, and we're wrecked?! Interesting...

I would love to see what these so called fans would say if they root for VT and lost to JMU.

It took UFelony two 4th downs (4th and 15 and 4th and 21) to beat Miami of Ohio. They scored TDs on both.

But we're wrecked?! Still interesting...

[Manolete]

Listen, it is what it is...all this negative talk is not going to help the situation...it was one game, and there are 10 games left....watch the Canes win the ACC, and play in a BCS game....so yall fake UM fans can SUCK A NUTT!!!!!!! GO CANES!

[Josh]

SHANNON'S MAKING EVERYONE MISS COKER. I THINK WE'VE ALL HAD ENOUGH.

[Josh]

SHANNON'S MAKING EVERYONE MISS COKER. I THINK WE'VE ALL HAD ENOUGH OF THIS GUY. WHO ARE THE TOP AVAILABLE COACHES?

[Wayne]

Congrats you Miami Fans... you have done it once more. The first 5 posts had me rockin with laughter. then the next 20 or so had me in pure discussed. After that maybe one or two were on the money. The rest was pure... Just a bunch of incoherent words. Wake up people and stop waisting your time and mine. If you are a true U of M fan if you can not say anything nice...BE QUIET...If you are not a fan of the U PLEASE FOR YOUR SAKE AND OURS...Go Away. Thanks

[MATTCANE]

Jacory needs a flawless performance the rest of the season and the Canes need to all but run the table; otherwise, his career at the U has been a colossal failure.

[steve]

Two loser coaches......

[Mariano]

I can not believe the negative racial comments and personal attacks on kids who are trying their best to give us fan something to be proud off. None of you ever played college football, because if you did, you would know it is not as easy as the great commentators makes it out to be. It takes a few years for the transition from high school to college level and into the pro's. I am proud to have Randy Shannon as the U Coach, and a quarterback like Harris. Stop badgering the team. I saw a team that has talent, and did not give up. They remind me of the time Miami lost to Washington in 2000 and we ran the table after that, and follow as the National Champs. If you negative people know so much about the game, put on a helmet go and try out for the team and show us how good you really think you are.
Miami 38 - Pittsburg 13

[Anonymous Cane]

After reading the posts today I'm sure of it... Are you Smarter than A Fifth Grader recruits their contestants on UM and Gator blogs.

What a collection of stupid, ignorant, unintelligent idiots...

[canzfan]

Based upon the practice stats, Whipple seems to be doing fine. If he's smart with the ball and doesn't throw pics, why not give him a try? It's about getting the ball to the right places, who cares if he doesn't have a cannon. Dorsey sure didn't.

[ted]

All these pervious post are a distraction....we need to focus on tackling!!!!

[ted]

tackle, tackle, tackle

[The Don]

The person who tweeted #UM QB Jacory Harris the racial remark is @motown305

[BT]

This blog is hilarious. You clowns watch football on the weekends and think you know what you are talking about. Jacory will break every passing record at UM- check the stats, he's on pace. He has played behind a mediocre line with little pass protection and not much run blocking to wit. Harris is phenomenal but has had some bad breaks. Don't take my word for it, check the game film. W/o dropped passes he's 31 for 39 against OSU. Don't over react to one game. Watch film from UNC last year, same thing. Miami is on the way back. You negative chokes better not celebrate when we win the ACC.

[Judy Sack]

Racist..........You people are freeking ILL. Get a grip...if you are NOT a CANE fan, go find something to do other than your stupid rants over here. If you are a Cane fan, you need to grow f.......ing up already. Dame, we played 2 games and ya'all are out to fire Randy & Jacory. I was not happy about our loss to the Suckeyes...I was upset with Jacory also...he needs to focuse and I beleive he will now that twittie twitter is gone...geez, nothing but BS on twitter....and we have to stand by our team. I could understand after many losses why the BS your saying here, but common guys/gals...1-1??? If you are a Gator fan posting, you have enough on your plate with 30 thugs in jail and or aressted..ROLMAO
WTW, I am from Miami & I am a HURRICANE FAN!!
It is time for all the above posts to stop and grown up........

[Manny Navarro]

We have tried to clean up the blogs as best we can. Unfortunately, there is no perfect system to stop troublesome people from posting comments on here. But I can assure you we are monitoring and deleting messages by posters with the same IP addresses who change names. Those IP addresses are being banned.

That being said, we're pretty sure they'll find a way to get back. All I can ask from the normal people on here who can have a normal conversation to ignore those who feel the need to spend all day on here trying to ruin it for others.

Thanks

[Manny Navarro]

For those of you wondering who sent Jacory Harris the racist tweets and personally attacked him, I found two posters on twitter.

Comments obviously aren't pleasant and I don't feel the need to give them any more attention than they need.

[Donna]

Can someone on this blog justify this:

Coach A

60-15 (.800) overall record
34-11 conference record
4-2 in bowl games
1 National title
Fired

Coach B
22-18 (.55) overall record
11-13 conference record
0-2 in bowl games; missed bowl game in other year
Contract extended

[CANES FAN]

MANNY:

By bringing in one of their qualified IT people the Sun Sentinel devised an effective solution to stop the person who had been posting the racist comments and posts where he posed as disgruntled Canes fans while employing numerous aliases to incite turmoil, just as he is doing on your blog.

Just the other night the racist apparently discovered a method to get back on the Sentinel site only to have his one racist hate message immediately scrubbed from the blog and that was the last we’ve heard from him.

Since he was banned from the Sun Sentinel site all of the racist garbage and countless derogatory posts designed to disrupt their blog have stopped and the dialogue has become civil and informative once again.

Not trying to slam the guy just for sport, but there is no question this guy is mentally unstable and could be dangerous as his hate has become stronger with each passing month that he is allowed to freely spew hatred on public blogs.

Unfortunately, just as he did to the Sentinel blog he has accomplished making your site unreadable and only irritates Canes fans that rely on you for information, while sharing comments with other Canes devotees.

[Junkie]

If we had an experienced coach we wouldn't need to bring in recycled idiots to help us.

[dk in LA]

It's not even fun to read the blog posts anymore with all of these idiots on here, It's a shame...

[vaustn]

it all makes sense now.....no wonder he isn't up to par as a coach. He's listening to the wrong people!! Dave Wannstedt? C'mon!!!! I've said it for a while now, although I do like Shannon as a defensive guy, heading coaching is not for him. Same with Wannstedt - good defensive coach but overmatched head coach.

[canesrule 21 'ships]

Manny: Canes Fan is right, you need to do it with the IT Department. The Curse of Art Kehoe now appearing as Donna has been banned by the SS and also, I believe, by The Post, so he is chumming over here. This is the same troll who posted as canesrule 21 'ships for a period of time, impersonating me.
This sicko will probably die if he is denied access to Cane fans from all three South Florida news papers.

[Ibis]

Thank you Manny for doing what you can to make this site a better place
Its a Cane site made to talk about Cane topics by Miami fans
Getting rid of that troll would be the best thing for all of us
Keep the information coming

[Ungar]

Thank you Manny for cleaning up the latest round of disgusting comments from the racist blog terrorist.

Now we can get back to discussin Pittsburgh.

Pittburgh is nowehre near the talent level of OSU. And we had a 10-3 lead versus OSU before their Luckeyes modus operandi kicked in.

We will have another 10-3 lead, but then it will go to 20-6, 30-9, and 40-12 or around there before this game is done.

[COOOOKOOOOO]

You guys are a bunch of babies. You spend all preseason hyping your team and players and once the season starts, you cannot handle the facts that you are an annual 4-7 loss team. Forget the stupid people posting disgusting comments, the facts speak for themselves.

Ohhh better email Mandy Navarro since I cant handle people pointing out we have a terrible head coach.

[Dr. Pinkus]

That racism twitter guy was obviously a gator fan disguising himself.

YAWWWWWWWWWWWWWNNNNNN

Just like Jacory Harris is a good QB.

[The Combo]

This is going to be a close game. Our incompetence will keep Pitt in it.

[jra]

If Coach Shannon loses to coach Wannstedt on Thursday things could get ungly fast. The "U" better be ready. Pitt does bring a hard nosed pro-style offense with very good running backs, big targets at wide receiver and a pretty good QB. But I do think the "U" will win this game. It will not be a blow out. It will be a hard fought victory. The "U" 28 Pitt 20. If we lose I do not want to hear any excuses. If the "U" takes the loss it will be for the simple reason that they were not as good as we expected. Get it done! GOOO! CANES!

[COOOOKOOOOO]

FACTS

Canes are 0-1 this year against D-1 opponents.

Canes have lost 3 of their last 5 against D-1 opponents.

Your head coaches record is 22-18 overall
11-13 against the weakest conference in the land.
0-2 in bowl games.

Get this, Randy Shannon would have to win 50 GAMES IN A ROW to just equal Larry Coker's winning percentage.

[Dr. Pinkus]

hey man, they have swagger. Or at least they almost have swagger. Well, their past swagger guarantees that they will get swagger.

they looked pretty swaggery climbing aboard the bus on the way out of the shoe

[Mariano]

Now I know ehy he calls hinslef COOOOkOOOOO, ROFLMAO

[The Combo]

Swaggery?

[Clean Blog = Happy Blog]

Mariano, you are right. He should be honest and put three K's in there though, we know that is his favorite "team".

[jra]

Agreed DK in LA. This "U" blog is turning into my daddy can beat up your daddy crap. Not to many posts about UM football. Just a bunch of posts with no facts and name calling. I guess most Cane fans are just over it. GOOO! CANES!

[DOUG113]

Well here comes 4 more ints, and from what I hear 'ol T.B. is the same, 3 more years canes fans and we might be good again- MAYBE

[DOUG113]

JRA- its turning into this kinda blog because 1) some of these new fans like to talk about how much better we're getting because we dont lose 48-0 no more, and how we can win the A.C.C - wow not the A.C.C. the worst BCS conference in the land are we really that "good" to win this conference? 2) because of that " shucks we gave it a try" attitude long time canes fans are angry- like i said before I remember a time we did'nt even hang conference title banners- but i guess i'm old

[Rico Nice]

To "Canes Fan" and the other Hurricane fans here, I am a Gator who wanted to point out that on the Gator Blog ("Gator Clause" by Joseph Goodman) and on every Gator article, there are countless Hurricane fans who do nothing but troll and write the same inane garbage (example 5 Nat. Championships > 3 National Championships, or something about UFelony or Urban Meyer being crazy, etc.). Believe me, the trolling by Cane fans on Gator blogs / articles is a thousand times worse than the trolling by "Gators" of UM articles. Also, I find it delusional how Cane fans are saying it was a Gator who tweeted Harris. I read the Cane articles all the time, and there are plenty of Cane fans who rip Jacory countless times, and often resort to racial remarks. Thanks for reading.

[DOUG113]

I dont know who cries on here more - the Jacory is still the best, give Randy 3 more years to turn it around people, or the people who write to complain about Gator fans saying " mean" things- get over it and dont reply to their comments and they'll leave- their like children ignore their behavior, and spend more time getting upset that they go 11-1 and win Championships , while our team goes 8-4 and most consider that just great- it really hurts to have to write that last part, but facts are facts

[DOUG113]

I have no real problem with Randy, but....... wasent he the D.C. when Craig Krenzel shredded our D in a national championship game? I mean how about that 4th and 13 call? I see alot of people on here talking about how much they loved him as the D.C. and well to tell you ALOT of people would have had success with that talented group