Florida International University, which has a win against Football Championship Subdivision Long Island this season and four losses against its fellow FBS competitors, also appears to be getting an early start in its search for its next head coach.
Multiple sources had told FootballScoop going into the 2021 season that FIU coach Butch Davis, the former Cleveland Browns head coach who as an assistant helped the Dallas Cowboys to a pair of Super Bowl wins in the 1990s, intended to retire after the season.
FIU officials have posted the position of “Head Coach, Florida International University” onto the American Football Coaches Association jobs board.
The job description reads:
“Florida International University (FIU) in Miami, FIU is seeking applications for the position of Head Coach. FIU is a member of Conference USA and offers seventeen (17) Division I sports programs. The successful candidate will provide the overall leadership for the sports program including recruiting.”
The architect behind the Miami Hurricanes' mid-1990s resurgence that resulted in the program's 2002 national championship under Larry Coker, Davis navigated the Hurricanes through NCAA sanctions and to a trio of Big East titles, a 51-20 overall mark during his time and an 11-1 season in his final year at Coral Gables.
Hired to run FIU's program after the 2016 season, Davis initially found immediate success for the Panthers. His teams won 23 games in his first three seasons at FIU, punctuated by a school-record nine wins in 2018.
But the Panthers since have struggled; they went winless during the COVID-19 abbreviated 2020 and coupled with their 1-4 start to this season have won just once in their past 10 games.
A request by FootballScoop for comment from FIU's sports information department was not immediately returned.