IF Riley & Company can recruit - I think he'll be extremely successful at NU. He & his staff had so many disadvantages trying to recruit to Oregon State: Sub-standard facilities (at best) - and what, 42 miles down the road from some of the best in nation, not just thee best in the PAC-10; virtually no tradition - other than something like 30 straight losing seasons prior to him coming back; and this one may be the biggest and most hard to wrap one's head around - a town with no commercial airport!
I'm not typically one to make excuses for myself or anyone else, but you've gotta admit, those are some pretty crappy cards.
As for NU being a Top 20, or 30, or 40 job? I don't know if it is or isn't. I do know this, you can call us "miopic" of whatever you'd like, but when your program is one of the four winningest of all-time ... and have sold out every home game for the last 52 years, I think some of that goes with the territory. Where the job "ranks" is a stupid argument - IT DOESN'T MATTER. The A.D. targeted a coach that was the polar opposite of Pelini (thank God), and I look forward to seeing what the guy can do with the resources that he'll have at his disposal. Fact is, NU's simply nowhere near as good as it used to be .. and that wasn't going to change without a change. And this is the new horse we're gonna ride ... we'll see, right