West Virginia head coach Neal Brown is another in a long line of people calling for helmet communication in college football. The NFL has adopted this technology, but college football has not. This leads to an army of coaches on the sidelines who are giving signs, holding up symbols, or wearing certain shirts to relay play calls. Brown thinks this is bad for the sport and makes college football look like a “clown show.”
West Virginia HC Neal Brown Calls For Helmet Communication
West Virginia HC Neal Brown is a BIG advocate for helmet communication in CFB🗣️
"If you look at our college sidelines, they look like clown shows right now. Different colored shirts, a bunch of people… We need to clean that up."
(via @Andy_Staples) https://t.co/NAZYWln3XK pic.twitter.com/kJytAbptsF
— On3 (@On3sports) February 22, 2024
Brown thinks it is a bad look for the sport. He talked about it with Andy Staples of On3.
“If you look at our college sidelines, they look like clown shows right now. Different colored shirts, a bunch of people. The staff has become so big and some people are just designed to do that. People have real systems. And so, we need to clean that up,”
He talked about how all of this was exposed during the Michigan sign-stealing scandal. A lot of college football coaches have expressed the need for helmet communication. It would make this type of scandal obsolete.
Brown Discusses Helmet Communication
Brown’s frustration is that the technology exists. He is not asking for something new to be created.
“The technology’s there. It makes no sense for us not to be able to do it. The helmet manufacturers are okay with it. We used it in the bowl game… I talked directly to the quarterback. Our defense coordinator talked directly to the linebackers and safeties. The thing that probably surprised me, I knew the benefits offensively, how it’d benefit us. But, it really helped us defensively,”
In the Duke’s Mayo Bowl, the team was able to use the technology successfully. The NCAA should pony up some money to make this happen.
West Virginia, like many teams, is hoping the helmet communication technology comes to college football sooner rather than later. It’s a change that should happen for the good of the sport.