1. College Football News Preview 2020: Florida Atlantic Owls Win Total Prediction, What Will Happen
Willie Taggart still hasn’t really won anything.
This is his fifth head coaching job nine seasons, and his overall record is 56-62.
He has never won a conference title in his 9.5 campaigns.
He has never won a bowl game, losing in the only one he coached in back at USF in 2015.
Nope, he has yet to win anything meaningful. But there’s a reason.
The 2009 Western Kentucky Hilltoppers went 0-12. Taggart took over the program in 2010 and went 2-10. After just one year, WKU came up with two straight winning seasons on his watch.
The 2012 USF Bulls went 3-9. Taggart took over the program in 2013, and like his first year at WKU, he went 2-10. He had a losing second season, and then won eight games in 2015, and ten in 2016 before going to Oregon.
The 2016 Oregon Ducks went 4-8. Taggart took over and went 7-6 the following year, setting the wheels in motion for the monster it currently is.
The 2017 Florida State Seminoles went 7-6, and while Taggart went 9-12 in his short run, it’s not like he was given a whole lot of time to make it all work.
No, Willie Taggart hasn’t really won anything, but he has rebuilt everything he has been a part of.
And now, he doesn’t have to do that – to a point.
Set The Florida Atlantic Owls Regular Season Win Total At … 8
Bet at BetMGM Win Total Line: 8
Okay, so there is some rebuilding to do on the defensive side, but it’s more like reloading after Taggart – for the first time in his career – gets to take over a team coming off a great season.
The offense will be fantastic, and the defense will be fine despite all the lost parts.
The Owls will get by Stony Brook, Charlotte, UTSA, and Old Dominion for a base of four wins. It’ll be good enough to get at least two more out of at Georgia Southern, at Southern Miss, at Middle Tennessee and against WKU, and it’ll find a way to pull off a few interesting wins along the way to get to eight.
But there are just enough concerns to keep this from being the powerhouse that Lane Kiffin enjoyed in two of the last three seasons.
Even with so much work to do, this should still be the favorite to win the Conference USA title for the third time in four seasons.
– What You Need To Know: Offense | Defense
– Top Players | Key Players, Games, Stats
– Schedule Analysis
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