Florida State plans to hire its next coach quickly
Florida State is without a permanent head coach after firing Willie Taggart on Sunday, but the program does not plan to remain in this state of limbo for long. If a school fires its head coach on Nov. 3, it does so explicitly to get a jump start on the competition.
Seminoles AD David Coburn gave a press conference Monday where he said he expects Florida State to have its next head coach in place by the end of the season -- at the latest.
It's hard to discern exactly what Coburn means by one comment, but if we can assume Florida State is after an active head coach, and if we can assume "in place" means Florida State has announced his hiring and not merely secured a behind the scenes handshake agreement... Florida State would be breaking lots of industry precedent by announcing said hire in the month of November.
Maybe Coburn is tipping his hand and indicating Florida State hires someone not actively in coaching.
Maybe he's parsing the difference between the end of Florida State's regular season -- Nov. 30 against Florida -- the end of Florida State's total season -- assuming they make a bowl game -- or the end of the college football season as a whole, all the way out in Jan. 13.
Or maybe I'm just reading too much into it.
Either way, I thought it was an interesting comment.
Another interesting comment? This one.
Of course, schools rarely hire a head coach without checking with their major donors first. (Whether that "checking with" is code for "giving them a heads up" or "receiving their permission" depends on the school.) And particularly not in this case, when the donors raised the $20 million required to root Taggart out, and after Florida State recently merged its athletics department with its ultra-powerful fundraising arm, Seminole Boosters. So none of that is exactly shocking.
But it is a case of an AD with very little athletics experience saying the quiet part loud. As Adam Kramer said on Twitter, "The best meals are cooked by 97 chefs at once."
Buckle up, because this could be an interesting month in Tallahassee, FL.
Update>
Sources tell FootballScoop FSU plans to use Glenn Sugiyama of DHR to lead the search. Sugiyama oversaw Utah State's search (which resulted in them re-hiring former head coach Gary Andersen), Arizona's search (Kevin Sumlin) and Oregon State's search (which resulted in hiring Jonathan Smith) recently (among others). Sugiyama also oversaw the search which placed Charlie Weis at Kansas.
