Wilson's First Season Brings Newfound Success

Norries Wilson had a year of firsts in his opening season as the head coach of the Columbia football team. He was the first new coach to win his first game since Buff Donelli in 1957. Under his watch, the Lions won their first Ivy game since 2004 and recorded their first .500 season since 1996. In perhaps the most meaningful accomplishment, Wilson became the first African-American head coach in Ivy League history.

After a 2-8 season in which they failed to win a single league game, the Lions went 5-5 overall and 2-5 in Ivy play.

This improvement can be explained in one word: defense. After allowing 33.7 points per game in 2005, the Lions allowed an Ivy-best 16.3 points a game in 2006. The defense featured many standout performers including senior linebacker Tad Crawford—who registered 101 tackles—and defensive lineman Darren Schmidt, who was named to the second Academic All-American team after a season with 16 tackles for loss and seven sacks.

The defense shined from the start, as the Lions seized the Liberty Cup to begin the season in a 37-7 trouncing of Fordham. After beating Georgetown 23-21, the team fell in its first Ivy game to Princeton 19-6 while the offense struggled mightily. As good as Lions’ defense was, the offense was equally poor, averaging only 15 points per game for the season. Against the Tigers, the unit mustered only 134 yards of total offense.
The weak point of the offense was the running game and an inability to get the ball in the end zone. Junior quarterback Craig Hormann threw for over 2,000 yards—en route to second team all-Ivy honors—and the Lions out-gained their opponents through the air, but Hormann threw for only seven touchdowns. Moreover, the team ran for only 678 yards all season on 2.6 yards per carry. Meanwhile, their opponents ran for more than double that amount.

The defense took all the pressure off the offense in the fourth game of the season in a 24-0 victory over Iona—the first shutout since 1998. Iona managed only 138 yards of total offense and gave up two defensive touchdowns.

Sitting at 3-1, the Lions ended the season with six straight Ivy games that would be the test of Wilson’s first season at the helm. It began much as the previous seasons had gone, as the Lions lost to Penn 16-0 and Dartmouth 24-7. Against the Quakers, Hormann threw for 246 yards but no touchdowns. The offensive struggles continued as the Lions lost to Yale 21-3 and Harvard 24-7. They scored first in both of those games but then were shutout from then on.

The defense did not allow more than 25 points in a single game, as it was the best scoring defense in the Ivy League, but the offense averaged 4.6 points per game in the team’s five losses on the season.

The Lions turned another potentially disappointing season around in their final two games, beating Cornell 21-14 thanks to 13 tackles and an interception return for a touchdown from senior Adam Brekke. The Big Red nearly came back to win, as, after pulling within seven, the team successfully attempted an onside kick and drove down the Lions to 19 before turning it over on downs.

In the final game of the season, Wilson won his second Ivy game and prevented a losing first season with a 22-21 thrilling victory over Brown. Sophomore Jon Rocholl made a 27-yard field goal with three seconds left to win the game.
On that note, Wilson’s first season was widely regarded as a success—especially given the state of the program he inherited.