Phil Longo has enjoyed a lot of success as a coordinator in a number of different conferences and levels of college football ranging from the Big Ten, ACC and SEC to the Division II and FCS level.
Entering his second season at Wisconsin, coming off a first year where the Badgers averaged about 24 points per game and 62nd in rushing and 71st in passing after losing some key offensive pieces during a season where they finished 7-6, Longo was asked about what he has reflected on this off season in terms of how to improve the Badgers offensive attack.
In his answer, he shared that he spent far too long early in his career without evaluating himself year-to-year, and a pivotal decision that helped to really accelerate his growth as a play caller.
"I probably went through the first seven or eight years of my career without ever evaluating myself. You would think that when you're young and you don't know much, that would be your greatest time of improvement because you're coming from nothing and you're progressing every year trying to develop yourself as a coach that can do the job."
"But I think, because I didn't evaluate my performance, the improvement wasn't what it needed to be early on."
"The two things that have happened over the course of my career that have just helped me personally, are 1) I started evaluating myself. You have to look in the mirror and ask yourself about the play calls and approach to teaching. The skillset that I'm teaching, is that the best thing I can do? Have I even evaluated any of that stuff and improved it over the past seven or eight years, and in the beginning of my career that answer was 'No.'"
"But when I started evaluating myself, I'm going to be critical of me more than anyone else, so that is where I really started to improve as a coach."
"The other thing was, I stopped traveling to use all of my time with offensive coaches. That's how I met Mike [Leach], that's how I met Kliff [Kingsbury], that's probably how I've adopted the philosophy that I have on offense."
"But the year that I started to visit with defensive coaches, is the year that I probably made the most progress. Because now all I do is seek out any defensive coordinator that will be honest about the game...because sometimes you have to compete against each other so you're not always willing to share."
Longo goes on to share that's how he developed a relationship with Luke Fickell early on.
"He was extremely honest. Luke has always been honest about everything. We shared ideas he was open about the positive and negatives that we do and that they did, and that's how I started my relationship with him."
Longo adds that between 2004 and 2006 is when he started spending more time with defensive coaches who would be open about schemes.
"You know, you think you have this play, and we draw this play up on the board and that is going to be really hard for the defense to defend and you feel great about it, but then you talk to a defensive coach and he's like 'Phil, that's really not that difficult, but if you all did this that's harder for us because it's a rule breaker, it's a problem.'"
"That's where you start to get honest feedback from a defensive coach and it helps make you better on your side of the football."