'Keeping a staff together is the biggest challenge in building a program'

Back on Thursday Rocky Long signed a two year contract extension at San Diego State that will keep him there thought 2017, which is pretty big considering that Long didn't expect to become a head coach when he took the defensive coordinator job under Brady Hoke in 2008.

"When I got here, I didn't think I'd ever be a head coach again, and because of the circumstances, and the opportunity arose, at the time it seemed like the better opportunity was to stay here rather than go with Brady. So far it's worked out well that way." Long explained.

In the clip, Long is vocal about his staff not being paid as well as other universities in California and other college staffs around the country. 

"I think that we all feel very fortunate that we're coaching here, and it's a great place to live and a nice place to recruit to and all that...but our coaches don't get paid very well. Andy Ludwig got a $250,000 raise to go to Wisconsin. Even if you wanted to stay here, you couldn't turn something like that down."

Then coach Long noted that keeping coaches around may be the single biggest challenge to building the program to the level that they want it to be.

We couldn't agree more. The programs that win consistently tend to be the ones who have staff continuity.

Long also has some interesting comments on the competition level of the Mountain West compared to the Big East at the 7:35 mark of the video below.