After days of speculation, Athletic Director Steve Orsini announced Tuesday that Phil Bennett will remain SMU’s football coach.
The announcement came at the conclusion of a two-day evaluation of SMU’s program, an assessment that didn’t revolve solely around Bennett’s employment.
“The spirit of the conversations were not, ‘I’m going to fire you,'” said Bennett, who added the evaluation was planned regardless of the outcome of Saturday’s game against Rice. “It truly was an evaluation. It was very thorough,” he said.
“Coach Bennett has exhibited the leadership traits necessary to put us in a good position to reach our goals,” Orsini said in a prepared statement. “While we did not succeed to the levels we had hoped this season, we continued to make progress. We will return SMU football to national prominence.”
In addition to reaffirming his confidence in his coach, Orsini developed a plan with Bennett to improve the program in the coming years.
While he did not go into specifics, Bennett did say it would include the creation of two new positions – an in-house recruiting coordinator and a high school relations director – an increased budget, and initiatives to increase student involvement in the program.
“We’ve got to get our students more involved,” said Bennett. “I thought our students this year really stepped up. …We’ve got some plans to do some things in spring training to get them involved and get them ownership in it.”
Bennett said the plan will also emphasize recruitment, because it’s the lifeblood of any college program.
“Bill Snyder [former Kansas State head coach] used to say it, ‘Recruiting is like shaving – if you don’t do it every day, you look like a bum,'” he said.
Bennett said the program has improved dramatically in the five years he’s been head coach.
“I thought this was the first year since I’ve been here that I could stand up and say ‘Yes, we should compete for a championship; we should be a bowl team,'” said Bennett. “It’s got to go to another level. It should have happened this year. With just a little bit of luck there would be a championship game being played here Friday.”
Bennett said while the team didn’t reach its ultimate goal of winning the conference championship and going to a bowl game, there are many positives to take from this season, and fans should focus on where his team has come in the past five years.
“We’re the fifth winningest team in the conference. When I first came here, we couldn’t win a conference game,” Bennett said. “We’re recruiting a higher-caliber athlete, and I think we will be a team to be reckoned with in the conference championship.”
Bennett also said he’s not worried about fans who aren’t happy he is keeping his job, because “it’s part of the business.”
“The only opinions that matter to me are the ones in charge. And that’s obviously Steve [Orsini] and [SMU President] Gerald Turner,” he said.
Bennett also said SMU’s rebuilding process is very different from that of Rice, where Todd Graham has led the Owls to their first bowl game in 45 years in just his first season as head coach.
“Four years ago they were 8 and 4, when was the last time SMU has been 8 and 4?” Bennett said. “They have 11 All-American receivers. When I got here I had to move a backup tight end to starting quarterback. They have a quarterback that threw 25 touchdown passes. They’ve had [academic] exemptions forever. SMU never had exemptions.”
“If you want to evaluate me, the only thing you have to look to is where we came from,” Bennett said.
Now that Bennett’s job security is intact, he said he feels relieved he can continue his passion.
“We get a chance to finish a job we’ve put our heart and souls into. I could never live with myself with first and goal twice at Rice and not winning that game, but I will hunt another day,” Bennett said. “I think we have an awesome commitment right now to the football program. That means a lot to me. I think it’s a commitment that mediocrity is not accepted… and the fact that he [Orsini] believes I’m the guy that can take this to the next level… I told him, I want to be a part of his team.”
