A little more in-depth review of his stints as a DC. Miller had quite a bit of success in his first two years at Michigan State, ranking in the Top 25 for Total D in 1999 and 2000 and putting a stout run D together in both seasons. He struggled as DC at Arizona State, finishing no better than 59th in Total D before moving on to Western Michigan last year.
The Bronco D was again average overall, but you can probably chalk a LOT of that up to facing West Virginia and Missouri with an overmatched unit. Both the Mountaineers and Tigers put up better than 540 yards of total offense in those games. Missouri put up over 600 yards. Take out those two games and suddenly Western Michigan is a Top 50 D.
As a LB coach, I like that Miller has shown the ability to stop the run. I think with a thin D-line next year, we're going to need our LB's to be good at supporting the run D and especially protecting against the option when we see Pat White and Matt Grothe. If we can't keep contain in that middle level of the defense, we could be in for a lot more LONG nights next season (Curtis Pulley is another dual-threat QB that comes to mind, along with all the great RB's we'll see next year).
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