The winners and losers on the SEC's coaching carousel
Another regular season is in the books, and like clockwork the SEC’s annual coaching carousel is back in motion once again.
One team has already changed head coaches while a few other coaches have been retained with contract extensions. Coordinators are being added and dropped like players on your fantasy team, and position coaches are earning promotions or scrapping for new jobs after old staffs were dissolved. Chaos reins supreme during this period of uncertainty, and the SEC’s 14 programs are just as much in flux as the coaches themselves.
Here are the winners and losers (so far) on the 2014 coaching carousel:
WINNERS
Auburn: The Tigers paid a hefty price ($1.6 million), but they proved to be the SEC’s biggest winners on the recent coaching carousel by attracting Will Muschamp to fill its vacant defensive coordinator position. Muschamp is one of the great defensive minds and great recruiters in all of college football, and his pairing with head coach Gus Malzahn gives Auburn one of the most accomplished coaching staffs in the conference. The Tigers defense lacked consistency throughout the last two years, finishing 2014 as the SEC’s ninth-best defense. Muschamp’s Florida teams, however, often boasted one of the best defenses in the conference (the Gators were second in the SEC in total defense in 2014 despite a 6-5 record). Again, the move wasn’t cheap, but it stands to benefit Auburn immediately as it closes 2014 and turns the page to the 2015 season.
Florida: The Gators were the first SEC team to make a major coaching change this offseason and the only team in the conference to fire its head coach. However, the Gators recovered nicely, going all the way to Fort Collins, Colorado (literally) to hire Colorado State’s Jim McElwain as its next head coach. McElwain is a Nick Saban disciple with experience coaching in the SEC, and he elevated Colorado State’s program to unprecedented success in just three years on the job. McElwain dazzled the Florida fan base from the start of his introductory press conference, and he’s already begun regenerating a buzz around the football program in Gainesville. Florida needed to hit a home run with this hire and it did so in attracting McElwain to take over the Gators.
Ole Miss: The Rebels lost linebackers coach Tom Allen on Sunday when he was hired as the defensive coordinator at South Florida, but Ole Miss remains a winner on this coaching carousel because of who it retained this offseason. The Rebels gave head coach Hugh Freeze a contract extension including a hefty raise to keep him in Oxford for at least the next four years. This signing occurred as other schools, including Florida, were heavily pursuing Freeze in an effort to attract him away from northern Mississippi. Instead, the Rebels retained the man who has brought them instant success in his three years at the helm of the program, and by giving him a raise and an extension it appears Ole Miss is in a position to sustain its recent success.
LOSERS
Kentucky: The Wildcats lost their offensive coordinator of the last two years when Neal Brown accepted the head coaching job at Troy, and since then they’ve struggled to find his replacement. Brown brought Hal Mumme’s Air Raid offense to Lexington when Mark Stoops was hired as head coach, and Kentucky’s offense steadily improved in his two years at the helm before departing for Troy. The Cats have recruited a four-star quarterback in Drew Barker and a number of touted wide receivers to fit the explosive offense, but without a coordinator to develop the young talent it might all be for naught. Kentucky needs to give its offense some direction, and the sooner that can happen the better.
Missouri: The Tigers have won back to back SEC titles and have boasted some of the fiercest defensive fronts in college football the last few years, thanks in large part to defensive coordinator Dave Steckel. Unfortunately for Mizzou, Steckel accepted a job over the weekend as the next head coach at Missouri State, leaving the Tigers defense searching for new leadership in 2015. Missouri stands to lose plenty of talent from this year’s defense, including defensive ends Shane Ray and Markus Golden, and in the past Steckel was an ace in replacing departed NFL talent with new, equally capable starters. That task will be much harder in 2015 without Steckel leading the defense, and Missouri could be facing a regression on that side of the ball as a result.
South Carolina: The Gamecocks never had a vacancy at defensive coordinator this offseason (Lorenzo Ward continues to fill that role), but you wouldn’t have known it by the way they pursued Muschamp to serve as their D.C. next year. South Carolina lost out in the Muschamp sweepstakes, and as a result it now has a negative aura surrounding the program despite not even making a coaching change this season. It’s tough to quality the Gamecocks as a team on the coaching carousel as it sits with its 2014 staff still in-tact, but it certainly did more to hurt itself than help itself during this chaotic season of coaching changes.
Texas A&M: The Aggies fired defensive coordinator Mark Snyder following another abysmal season on defense, and like South Carolina it lost out in the Muschamp sweepstakes. However, unlike South Carolina, A&M never had someone filling that position in the first place, and upon missing out on Muschamp the Aggies were forced to revert to square one in their search for a D.C. Few defenses in the nation tackled worse than Texas A&M last season, but there is a silver lining in the form of young, budding freshmen like Myles Garrett and Armani Watts. Without a coordinator that talent might be wasted, meaning A&M must make a signature hire sooner than later.
Vanderbilt: Commodores head coach Derek Mason made some drastic changes to his staff following a disappointing 3-9 season, firing offensive coordinator Karl Dorrell and defensive coordinator David Kotulski in addition to a number of assistants. To this point, Vandy hasn’t been able to find a replacement for any of its terminated coaches. Even Boise State offensive coordinator Mike Sanford turned down double his current salary to hold the same position at Vanderbilt. Mason is going to have to find some hidden gems to make their coaching breakthroughs on his staff next year, but for now those positions remain unfilled and Vanderbilt remains among the biggest losers on this year’s coaching carousel.