I want to make it clear that I'm not saying this to be malicious towards CKW. I personally like him and respect him as a coach, and a wiser older man (although some may disagree with the last part). I didn't like his firing. What Wilson did bring was toughness, and he demanded that you be tough/aggressive. He forced you to respect the program, and he didn't accept any complaining. The team needed that, the team needed to demand more from itself. this was a coach that I personally saw tackle a running back in practice for not running hard enough. Some may call that over the top, but no one viewed that as (abuse), and that is the kind of intensity that he brought. That helped the team improve, and I think that Stephen Houston will tell you that he's happy in hindsight that Wilson took that sort of interest in his practice performance.
It's also true however that what he brought in toughness, he simply didn't bring to defense or any kind of organization. I know for a fact that many players didn't have a playbook on defense, and that even the few who had one prepared didn't really take an interest in it. This was evidenced in games like Rutgers in 15' or Minnesota in 13' or even BSU in 12'. If it seemed odd that a defense would look that incompetent even with improved recruiting, its 100% because having a football IQ was not enforced. Even look at Michael Hunter's improved performance when he went to Oklahoma State and now he's on the New York giants. This is the same Michael Hunter who was torched against Bowling green in 14'. I don't think his poor performance was a reflection of talent per se, but coaching and a lack of organizational structure. The same coach who would tackle offensive guys for not going hard and demand results, simply didn't have that level of structure on the defensive side whatsoever. Mike was one of the more talented players I played with, and I'm proud of him. He got so,e heat on the board for transferring, but I think that he highlights what was going on in our program compared to other programs, and the move paid off for him. He's more physically gifted than players we have lining up today, but we never saw that at IU and I think that it was largely due to the lack of structure. And although it's not CKW's fault per se, it is his problem as the head coach. At a certain point you'd expect him to step in and fire a coach mid season if need be for the complete negligence.
So on one hand Wilson brought a certain level of toughness and enthusiasm that was needed. On the other hand there was a certain lack of structure brought to the defensive side, and he didn't particularly enforce structure consistently. He got guys to play hard, but does that help if you don't understand cover 3? Players like Hunter didn't just magically improve when they left. There must've been a different level of structure at Oklahoma state. My assumption would be that TA brought this kind of structure which is why Scales went from being just a good linebacker, to maybe one of the best in school history. Or why fields went from being a rotational backup to one of the top DB's in the conference. Or why some guys who played in 15' magically disappeared from the lineup in 16'. I think that moving forward TA is going to have the program in good hands because he brings Wilson's toughness, but also doesn't have that side of recklessness/negligence from what I see. I have never met TA because my final year was the season before he came in, but just as an observer who knows many of those guys, there's a difference.