Dykes filling big shoes with own style
ARLINGTON — Sonny Dykes has been around college football pretty much his whole life, long enough to know not to follow coaches commemorated in stone.
Yet here Dykes was Thursday at Big 12 media days, preparing for his first season at TCU as the successor to Horned Frogs legend Gary Patterson.
“There’s not many places where there’s a statue of that coach in front of the stadium,” Dykes said, “and certainly not a coach that was still coaching at that institution when that statue was placed there.”
Patterson is now a special assistant to Texas coach Steve Sarkisian and still fondly remembered by Big 12 rivals.
“It was tough to go through our Big 12 meetings and not get educated by coach Patterson,” Iowa State coach Matt Campbell said.
For all the reverence, there’s a reason for Patterson’s unceremonious departure last fall from the job he’d held for nearly 21 seasons. Things like the Rose Bowl win in the 2010 season and the shared Big 12 title in 2014 were rapidly receding memories. The Horned Frogs are 23-24 in the past four seasons, including 15-21 in the Big 12.
Enter Dykes, making the 40mile move from SMU, where he was 30-18 in four seasons.
He’s not worried about what he’ll face in Fort Worth.
“TCU is about winning championships,” Dykes said. “There’s a high level of expectations. Obviously I knew that when I took the job. I appreciate that. I want to coach in this kind of environment where there has been that level of success and there’s that level of expectations as well.
“I think that’s what drives us all to be better and is what challenges us.”
Whether Dykes can match or surpass what Patterson achieved is to be determined.
For now Dykes has brought a new style to TCU.
Patterson was essentially two personalities, as he often acknowledged. Gary could be a funny, laid-back guy with a love of songwriting. Coach P was an altogether different animal who could be demanding, abrasive as steel wool and an overall chore to be around.
Dykes has taken more of an open-door approach with players, media and fans.
It may not last past the opener at Colorado on Sept. 2. For now, it feels fresh. “Everyone has bought in,” said defensive back Tre’Vius Hodges-Tomlinson, a two-time all-Big 12 selection and the nephew of TCU great LaDainian Tomlinson. “We like what they’re doing. They’re players’ coaches. They’re doing what the players want.”
So far, so good.
Of course, a whole lot awaits Dykes in Year 1, including the choice of a quarterback between three-year starter Max Duggan and Chandler Morris, who impressed in limited duty last season after transferring from Oklahoma.
Spring practice came and went without a decision. Neither were brought to media days.
“For us it was a very important decision to make, and it’s a decision (where) we needed more evidence to be able to make it,” Dykes said. “I felt like if you put on the Baylor game last year and watched Chandler play in that game, you’d go, ‘Well, this guy has to be a starting quarterback.’ ”
That was the game where Morris led an upset of Baylor, throwing for 461 yards.
“If you put on some other games in Max’s career and watch him perform, you’d go, ‘This guy has to be a starting quarterback,’ ” Dykes said. “We have a unique opportunity where we have two quarterbacks who played at a high level that both have a high ceiling. We have to see who the most consistent one is.” Dykes had plenty of success with quarterbacks at SMU, but Shane Buechele (Texas) and Tanner Mordecai (Oklahoma) came from elsewhere. For now, Dykes has no other choices.
There’s also the question of what’s a reasonable expectation for Dykes’ first season.
“That’s a good question,” Dykes said. “I’ll have a better idea once we get to fall. I think we came out of spring ball ahead of where I thought we’d be. I think we’re ahead of where I thought we’d be today based on watching players work out.
“I’m hopeful when we start (practice) on Aug. 2 we’re still ahead. Hopefully by the time we play in September, we’re still ahead.”