College Football Coaching Openings

In a normal college football season, the first week of November is about the time that the carnival workers take the cover off and start lubricating the annual coaching carousel as rumors of firings and backroom dealings begin to fly.  But this has hardly been a normal season in terms of coaching stability.  The firings began in September; Scott Frost was the first to part company with Nebraska and there have been plenty of other schools that followed suit to date.  Here is a list seven firings off the top of my head – – so there must be others:

1. Scott Frost – – Nebraska
2. Herm Edwards – – Arizona St.
3. Karl Dorrell – – Colorado
4. Bryan Harsin – – Auburn
5. Geoff Collins – – Ga Tech
6. Jeff Scott – – USF
7. Paul Chryst – – Wisconsin

On that list, only the job at USF is outside the so-called Power-5 Conferences; that means there should be plenty of eager aspirants for ADs to pursue.  There are several “Candidate Categories” where ADs and/or search committees do business; surely, these will be fertile hunting grounds in this season of wide-open coaching positions.

Athletic Directors like to find a coach at a “small program” who has been incredibly successful and hire him to being his energy and his “culture” to a bigger program.  Sometimes that works out very well, but sometimes it does not.  Bryan Harsin came to Auburn after plenty of success at Boise St.; Geoff Collins came to Ga Tech after success at Temple.; Scott Frost had an undefeated season at UCF. I think folks will go fishing in this pool again this year and there are several names that come to my mind:

• Hugh Freeze (Liberty).  He has been the head coach at Liberty since 2019.  This year, the Flames are 8-1 and have been ranked in the Top 25.  His overall record as of today is 34-12.
• Deion Sanders (Jackson St.).  He has used his celebrity status to recruit talent to play for a team in the SWAC.  Conventional thinking is that he could be even more successful in recruiting with a more prominent program to sell to athletes.  Jackson St. is 9-0 this year and in Sanders’ tenure there, his record is 19-1.
• Jamey Chadwell (Coastal Carolina):  He has been on the job since 2019 and after a 5-7 record in his first year there, the Chanticleers have gone 19-2.

Another candidate category are former college coaches who have been on the sidelines for a year or so.  Five candidates of this type come to mind:

1. Tom Herman – – had success at Houston and Texas
2. Bronco Mendenhall – – had success at BYU and UVa
3. Dan Mullen – – had success at Mississippi St. and Florida
4. Urban Meyer – – of course
5. Chris Petersen – – had success at Boise St. and Washington

Naturally, anyone who had been a head coach in the NFL can be considered a target for these jog searches so maybe these guys will get a call or two:

• Bill O’Brien
• Matt Rhule
• Frank Reich

And of course, there are always the “hot coordinators” who have been guiding parts of very successful team who are seen as being able to bring that level of excellence with them.  This year, I went to look up the names of coordinators that fit that description because I rarely can identify college coordinators if asked to do so directly.

• Jim Chaney – – Offensive coordinator at Tennessee
• Kenny Dillingham – – Offensive coordinator at Oregon.
• Phil Longo – – Offensive coordinator at UNC
• Glenn Schumann – – Defensive coordinator at Georgia
• Ryan Walters – – Defensive coordinator at Illinois

And of course, there is always the “tug at the heartstrings” candidate – – the guy who returns to his alma mater to right the ship.  This year, the opening at Colorado is a perfect fit for Eric Bienemy the offensive coordinator for the KC Chiefs.  Please note that sort of hiring does not always equate with success; Scott Frost returned to Nebraska as a knight in shining armor and he was the first coach fired this year.

Normally, this sort of thinking would happen after Thanksgiving and into the first week of December, but this has not been a normal college football season in lots of ways.  In addition to the coach firings to date consider:

• The CFP will happen without the presence of either Alabama or Clemson.

I did not see that coming back in August.

Finally, when a coach is fired, that means there has been a significant failure at one of the national collegiate institutions.  So, let me close with this observation by Groucho Marx that just might fit the mood in the coaching ranks today:

“No one is completely unhappy at the failure of his best friend.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………