As it turns out, Bob Stoops is not a serious candidate for the Florida State head coach opening. The Seminoles have been conducting interviews with other candidates and will continue that process through Thanksgiving according to The Tallahassee Democrat.

Stoops coached Oklahoma for 18 years from 1999-2016, posting a 190-48 record (.798 win percentage). The Sooners posted 14 10-win seasons under Stoops, but he surprisingly stepped away from coaching during the 2017 summer at 55 years old.

He will return to football as a coach and general manager in the XFL next spring. With that return to coaching, it would only be natural to see Stoops also consider college football opportunities, but apparently Florida State won’t be one of them.

The Tallahassee Democrat reports Memphis coach Mike Norvell, Iowa State’s Matt Campbell and Penn State coach James Franklin are the leading candidates to be the next Florida State coach.

The Seminoles have their football head coach position open for the second time in a two-year span because they fired Willie Taggart 21 games into his tenure. Taggart replaced Jimbo Fisher, who left for a massiv contract with Texas A&M at the end of the 2017 season.

If it were up to the Florida State players, they would stop the coaching search right now and remove the “interim” tag for coach Odell Haggins. He is in his second stint as interim coach for the Seminoles, and he’s 3-0. Florida State won two games, including the Independence Bowl, when he was interim head coach at the end of 2017, and the Seminoles defeated Boston College last week under Haggins’ direction.

Florida State is 5-5 and needs a victory against Alabama State or Florida to be bowl eligible.