Is Danny Hope gone? Mixed feelings. I like the guy and the team clearly does as well. After the Minnesota debacle I thought he had lost his team...but the last three games convinces me that that is not true. We are bowl eligible...should be interesting. It will be a minor bowl (again)...we have not beaten a team with a pulse but we took both undefeated teams (tOSU and ND) down to the wire and arguably should have beaten both of them.
I guess it's a tough decision, I'm sure your AD has been working the "back channels" to see who's out there that would be interested and what will it take to bring them to Purdue. Have there been names suggested on your Purdue mailing lists?
Looks like Hope has been fired: http://www.hammerandrails.com/football/2012/11/25/3689894/danny-hope-has-been-fired/in/3378381
No decision on the coaching search. Rumor has it that Morhan Burke is alwas keeping a list of who h wants and probably already knowswho he wants. He has msde some pretty good hires over the years.
Darrell Hazell had a great year at Kent State and I don't expect him to be there long.....not sure I want him in the conference tho!? Tress was always very high on him.....expect him to be a hot commodity in the off season.
He is definitely on the list.... Brian Neubert With the Danny Hope Era having now met its end, the focus turns to who's next at Purdue. This coaching search has been a long time in the works, as Purdue at this time a year ago laid the groundwork for a search before ultimately electing to give Hope a contract extension just prior to the Little Caesars Pizza Bowl. Among the coaches on Purdue's radar a year ago in the event a search be necessary were then-Wisconsin offensive coordinator Paul Chryst, then-Houston coach Kevin Sumlin, Wyoming coach Dave Christensen, North Dakota State coach Craig Bohl and Illinois State coach and former Purdue defensive coordinator Brock Spack. Since then, that landscape has changed considerably. Sumlin, a Purdue alumnus, took the Texas A&M job. Chryst, who Purdue courted to be Joe Tiller's successor prior to Hope's firing, accepted the Pittsburgh job. Those ships have sailed. And Christensen's star has faded this season in Laramie. Spack, whose 8-2 Illinois State team is ranked 15th in the FCS ranks, could merit interest again. Below, GoldandBlack.com takes a look at some at some possible or logical coaches of interest for Purdue as it hits the open market. Butch Jones The Cincinnati coach will be one of the most-talked about coaches this hiring season and Purdue has been among those to already get in his ear. He's the reigning BIG EAST Coach-of-the-Year. The Bearcats are 8-3 this season, regarded by some as the best coaching job Jones has done at UC since replacing Brian Kelly there. An offensive-minded coach with a background in spread offenses dating back to his days on Rich Rodriguez's staff at West Virginia, Jones will considered hot commodity should he choose to solicit interest from major programs in more renowned BCS conferences. Confirmed Purdue interest Sonny Dykes The Louisiana Tech coach is known as an offensive innovator from the Mike Leach coaching tree, a former colleague of both Leach and Dana Holgorsen at Texas Tech. LaTech won eight games last season and is now 9-3 this year with an offense that averages 50-and-a-half points. Prior to moving to Ruston, Dykes - the son of former Texas Tech coach Spike Dykes - was the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Arizona for three seasons. He'll be one of the hottest commodities on the market this year, already linked to SEC openings. Confirmed Purdue interest Dave Doeren The second-year Northern Illinois coach is winning big after taking over for current Minnesota coach Jerry Kill in 2011. The Huskies are 11-1 - the lone loss being an 18-17 setback versus Iowa (in a game played in Chicago) - and headed to the MAC title game against Kent State, after winning 11 games and a league championship last season. NIU was ranked 24th in last week's coaches poll. Doeren, whose background in on defense, came from Wisconsin, probably the model program for Purdue in the Big Ten. According to industry sources, Doeren has his eyes on the Purdue job. Purdue has shown interest in Wisconsin ties before when it pursued Chryst in 2008. Confirmed Purdue interest Tim DeRuyter Fresno State's head coach has led the Bulldogs to a 9-3 season in his first year with the program, with two of its losses coming to Oregon and Boise State. Formerly Texas A&M's defensive coordinator under Mike Sherman and the program's interim head coach for its bowl win over Northwestern last year, DeRuyter is a California native and Air Force alumnus with some distant Midwest ties. DeRuyter is a defensive coach by trade, but has fielded an offense this season that's averaged better than 40 points per game. Confirmed Purdue interest Mark Helfrich According to sources close to the pending search, the Oregon offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach is one of the most prominent names on Purdue's list of possibilities. Working at the side of Duck head coach and renowned offensive innovator Chip Kelly, Helfrich has been part of a fast-paced Oregon offense that's been not only one of college football's most productive, but also its scariest and, in recruiting terms, coolest. Confirmed Purdue interest Darrell Hazell The former Ohio State assistant is another former Big Ten coach winning big in the MAC, as his Kent State team is 11-1 headed to the MAC title game against Northern Illinois. The Golden Flashes, which knocked Rutgers from the ranks of the unbeaten, were ranked 23rd in last week's polls. Purdue has never had an African-American head coach in football or men's basketball. Former Boilermaker assistant coach Brian Rock is the offensive coordinator at Kent State. Hazell was Jim Tressell's assistant head coach and receivers coach from 2005-2010 with the Buckeyes. Previously, he worked at Rutgers and West Virginia, coaching receivers and running backs, respectively. Confirmed Purdue interest Other coaches worth mentioning Brock Spack The one potential candidate who knows the ins and outs and inherent challenges of the Purdue job better than anyone in college football, Spack was Joe Tiller's defensive coordinator for the entirety of the head coach's 12-year run with the Boilermakers. In that time, Purdue won 87 games and played in 10 bowl games, including the 2010 Rose Bowl. Spack is 27-17 as Illinois State's head coach, leading a notable turnaround after taking the job in 2008. The Redbirds are 8-3 and bound for the FCS playoffs. Spack's one of 20 finalists for FCS Coach-of-the-Year honors. Greg Olson The Boilermakers' quarterbacks coach during its glory days of the late 1990s, the current Jacksonville Jaguars quarterbacks coach and assistant head coach is one of the NFL's most respected QB coaches, a key figure in Drew Brees' college success and a potential hire that would underscore the importance quarterback play has always held in the history of Purdue football. He'd come with a glowing recommendation from Brees, whose career the program is still benefiting from. Along with Sumlin and Jim Chaney, Olson was part of the Purdue offensive staff that made its passing game one of the game's most productive. Jim Chaney Purdue's offensive coordinator during its upswing under Tiller, Chaney was an integral part of making the Boilermakers into one of the nation's top passing teams and one of its most cutting-edge offenses. He's since worked in the NFL and most recently, as the offensive coordinator at Tennessee. After Derek Dooley's firing, Chaney served as interim coach for the Vols' win over Kentucky in the regular season finale. Chuck Martin Notre Dame's offensive coordinator has been a key figure on Brian Kelly's staff as the Irish have played their way into the national title game. Martin's coached for Notre Dame on both sides of the ball under Kelly and has experienced tremendous success as the head coach at Division-II power Grand Valley State, where he his teams were 74-7 and won back-to-back D-II titles in 2005-06. Precedent says Purdue wouldn't shy away from hiring off a rival's staff; it was very interested in then-Irish defensive coordinator Bob Davie in 1997, before Davie was tabbed as Lou Holtz's successor. Dave Clawson The Bowling Green coach has turned around the Falcon program and won everywhere he'd been prior. He was twice named I-AA Coach-of-the-Year, once at Richmond and once at Fordham and spent a season as the offensive coordinator at Tennessee prior to his hiring. Clawson is known in part for his ability to develop quarterbacks. Bowling Green is 8-4 this season, two of those losses coming at Florida and Virginia Tech. Pete Lembo The second-year Ball State coach took over for Brady Hoke in Muncie and has kept the Cardinals winning and taken down some BCS-program opponents in the process, beating Indiana each of the past two seasons and winning over South Florida earlier this season. Lembo was previously the head coach at Lehigh and Elon, but does not have any BCS-program experience. Ball State finished the season 9-3 and winner of six in a row after back-to-back losses to MAC unbeatens Kent State and Northern Illinois. Randy Fichtner Ben Roethlisberger's quarterbacks coach with the Pittsburgh Steelers, Fichtner's been with the Steelers five seasons now, the first three of which he coached wide receivers. Fichtner is a Purdue alumnus and former Jim Colletto assistant coach who's father, Ross Fichtner, was a great player for the Boilermakers in the 1950s. Randy Fichtner was the offensive coordinator at Memphis prior to moving up to the NFL to join Coach Mike Tomlin's staff. Tony Dungy The ultimate long-shot candidate it would seem, the former Super Bowl-winning Indianapolis Colts coach-turned-TV analyst might at least merit a phone call, if for nothing else than a consultation. Incoming Purdue president Mitch Daniels is the outgoing governor. Two of the most prominent people in Indianapolis during the past decade or so surely crossed paths on occasion. Jim Tressel Another extraordinary unlikelihood, but one we'll include here just to appease the local rumor mill. The former Ohio State coach is still bound by the five-year show-cause penalty slapped on him by the NCAA and would need to sit out a six-game penalty wherever he coaches next, if he coaches. More of a figurehead-type coach known for boring offense, it's not an ideal fit anyway. But Tressel knows how to win in the Big Ten and there's no reason Purdue couldn't at least solicit his input.