Mark Dantonio surprised college football by deciding to retire a day before February's national signing day. Dantonio stepped away as Michigan State's all-time winningest coach with a record of 114-57 and three Big Ten Titles.
Michigan State hired a search firm (DHR) and set out to talk with some of the hottest names of the 2019-20 coaching carousel, including reportedly reaching out to Iowa State's Matt Campbell early on in the process and also had Luke Fickell and Mel Tucker high on their list. After all of those candidates originally decided to stay put, the search circled back to Mel Tucker who, after one 5-7 season in Boulder, ultimately decided that the package Michigan State had put together
As some extra incentive to make the move, Michigan State offered to more than double Tucker's salary from what Colorado was paying him (making him one of the top 15 highest paid head coaches in college football), and also gave him an assistant coach salary pool of $6 million - which would rank among the top 10 of all college football programs.
Tucker's staff, with a few defensive holdovers (Burton and Tressel) from Dantonio, is a mix of some of his guys from Colorado, and some guys familiar with Michigan State (Hawkins and Barnett).
More salary information will be updated as it becomes available.