Penn State DCoord Brent Pry will be the new Va.Tech HC. He's been with Franklin at Vanderbilt and Penn State.
I would offer Freeman right now and give Rees a hefty increase. Kelly is reportedly after both of them and told Freeman he'll make him the highest paid DC in the nation . If ND is serious about football they'll take my advice and stop the bleeding now. Start paying their coaches what the market calls for. Every day they wait they risk losing coaches, current players and recruits.
Well Sources say that Urban Meyer is not interested in returning to college football....so take him off the ND coach search list!
The thing that really irks me when I listen to the talking heads on sports radio is they say Brian Kelly has dine as much with Notre Dame and that you can't win a NC at ND. To me it's Brian Kelly has done as much as HE can at ND. He showed me Notre Dame could get back to being relevant again but HE couldn't take the step to get ND to the elite status. Kelly didn't like recruiting, Marcus Freeman does and he is good at it.
I guess I dodged a bigger bullet that I thought. Apparently (we'll never see this officially) but L$U offered Jimbo $13 million over 8 years and he turned it down. I can't say if he'll ever win the whole enchilada again, but I feel pretty good about knowing who my coach is for the next decade. (Who knows what college football will look like in 5 years much less 10 tho...)
There is more to this story than we are aware of. Swarbrick said that Kelly did not offer him an opportunity to match. That tells me that more than money, Kelly simply wanted out. Tommy Rees said that he learned about this on social media last night. Kelly said he offered Rees a position yesterday so those stories don't match up. Kelly was allegedly on a recruiting trip with an un-named assistant coach and that coach made a statement that he heard about Kelly's hire in a text as they were exiting a recruit's home. He said it made me feel like a "F*cking asshole". Kelly told Freeman that he'll make him rich at LSU yesterday..... that's a bold statement from a man who has not even signed his new contract yet. That tells me this has been in the works for some time. Swarbrick better work quickly and decisively or this program could be set back 5+ years.
Everything I'm reading points to Marcus Freeman getting promoted to HC. Kind of ironic in a way, Luke Fickell reportedly would leave UC for either Ohio State if Day leaves for the NFL which at this point there is nothing to indicate Day is interested in leaving Ohio State, and Notre Dame when Brian Kelly retires. So his top lieutenant, Marcus Freeman, goes to ND and in 1 year the job is open but Fickell is not in a position to take the job because he's in the CFP if he beats Houston. What's the outcome, his former DCoord gets the job he would have liked to have been a candidate.
From ISD ref Freeman: Marcus Freeman - Notre Dame Defensive Coordinator All Freeman has done is take over a defense that lost its best linebacker in camp and then lost it’s All-American safety halfway through the year and he still managed to lead a top-15 defense in SP+ and FEI. They are coming off a dominant November and are playing their best football at the moment. The man can coach and he also has a dynamic personality. He’s the best recruiter they’ve had as a coordinator during the Brian Kelly and second isn’t all that close. It would be a smart move to give him the interim tag to give him a shot to lead right now and also see how he can keep the recruiting classes together. He hasn’t been a head coach, but that didn’t stop Lincoln Riley from having success despite him having no previous experience.
First of all, I'm not sure that Swarbrick has the final say at big contracts. It may well be that Jenkins is Scrooge and Kelly had had enough asking for market value. I remember when Lou left (or was pushed out) and it seemed like all the assistants were also leaving. I also remember that fans were in a panic mode that Bob Davie would be leaving. Even though he had no head coaching experience we put him in charge. I think that Campbell would be Swarbrick's first choice but it will take some bucks and i'm not sure Jenkins is on board. I'm through with experiments like Davie and Faust. Let's get a proven HC.
Well now that Kelly leaving has settled in my mind and realizing that I was just naive enough to believe he really loved Notre Dame for me it just pisses me off on the timing. He did this before when he left Cincy so I shouldn’t be surprised he does it again. He couldn’t wait till after signing day? That really tells me what type of person he is. No coach who really loves ND would do that. Now the key to KEEP Notre Dame going in the right direction Swarbrick needs to take the risk and hire Marcus Freeman. He is the man we need now. Right now.
Florida - Billy Napier (Louisiana head coach) Georgia Southern - Clay Helton (former USC head coach) Louisiana Tech - Sonny Cumbie (Texas Tech offensive coordinator) LSU - Brian Kelly (Notre Dame head coach) New Mexico State - Jerry Kill (TCU interim head coach) SMU - Rhett Lashlee (Miami offensive coordinator) TCU - Sonny Dykes (SMU head coach) Texas Tech - Joey McGuire (Baylor associate head coach) UConn - Jim Mora (former UCLA head coach) UMass - Don Brown (Arizona defensive coordinator) USC - Lincoln Riley (Oklahoma head coach) Washington - Kalen DeBoer (Fresno State head coach) Washington State - Jake Dickert (interim head coach) Virginia Tech - Brent Pry (Penn State defensive coordinator) --
Rich Rodriguez to Jacksonville State. He was the offensive coordinator at Louisiana Monroe. He may have been a head coach for some schools in the past.