This season of NCAA football has definitely been one for the books. Top 10 teams continuously fell to unranked teams, the number two spot was basically cursed and a huge number of coaches retired or were fired, leading to a huge coaching turnover.
But while other universities knew within a few days or weeks who their new head coach would be, SMU is still in the dark as to who is taking over for Phil Bennett.
Bennett was fired on Oct. 28. Between then and now, a number of other NCAA coaches have been fired and hired.
Texas A&M fired coach Dennis Franchione (Yes, we know he supposedly resigned, but the way he walked out of that press conference says a lot) and have now hired Mike Sherman, former coach of the Green Bay Packers.
Southern Miss’ Jeff Bower “resigned” after 14 winning seasons and 10 bowl invitations in only 11 years. Arkansas coach Houston Nutt resigned Monday, giving up his job just three days after directing the Razorbacks to a victory over top-ranked LSU. However, Ole Miss has already hired Nutt to replace Ed Orgeron, who was fired Sunday after finishing the season 3-9.
Baylor understandably fired Guy Morriss and has already introduced Houston’s Art Briles as their new coach.
You get the idea – other schools are already ordering new wardrobes for their new hires and we’re still waiting and wondering.
Yes, this entire game of NCAA musical chairs has gone on since SMU fired Bennett. Yet we still have no ideas of prospects, no names being seriously considered or, at least, none that we know about.
It’s not that we don’t trust Athletic Director Steve Orsini – we do. But the silence is killing us.
We’re dying for some news or even a hint of who might be good enough to help the Mustangs actually win a few games. And we don’t mean from some Web site that looks like it was designed by a fifth grader.
The next coach has to succeed – so you can’t blame us for wanting to know sooner, rather than later, who it’s going to be.
Hopefully we’ll get a pleasant surprise next week.
Because we don’t think we can wait much longer.
