Read the arguments from Loyal Homer and Bleacher Fan about which football organization/program made the best decision about its head coaching position.
It was a normal feeling morning on campus in Los Angeles. The morning winter air was brisk, but temperatures would warm some later. No worries, right? Good weather, good location, good times.
Then Southern Cal head coach Pete Carroll took a call from the Seattle Seahawks organization, an organization that wished to break promises and fire its current coach, Jim Mora. All of a sudden there was an intense need to move in a different direction, and Pete Carroll was squarely in the team’s sites.
Normally Carroll would dismiss the opportunity out of hand. But, with allegations of recruiting violations and the specter of inconsistencies surrounding the tenure of Reggie Bush, Carroll felt if there ever was a time to leave the university for another position, it was now. And in a blink of an eye, overnight, Carroll was gone. Goodbye sunshine, hello rain (perhaps a metaphor for the decision?).
Coming off a poor season, USC found itself in another strange position – coachless. The situation was so dire and uncertain that recruits were taking the initiative to hold the recruiting class together. One free safety USC commit even started a group on Facebook called “Let’s keep the 2010 USC Football recruiting class together!!”
The school was in a real lurch. All of the necessary steps were taken by the university, with no stop left unpulled. Chris Peterson was called, but unwilling to budge from Boise State. Talks with Steve Mariucci never materialized into anything serious. Jack Del Rio ultimately decided to keep his home address in Jacksonville (for some reason).
The phone system within the USC athletic department probably started smoking with the volume of phone calls made and received over the few days of uncertainty that followed the sudden departure of Pete Carroll. Then USC did something that seemed impossible. A very vocal coach who was already mixing things up in the SEC and engrained at a university with a long and storied football history agreed to speak about the head coaching position at USC. Southern Cal used its leverage made a call upon history to Lane Kiffin.
No matter what fans and media think of Lane Kiffin’s character (which I happen to think is without integrity), USC acted quickly and decisively, saving both the 2010 recruiting class, the hope of the 2010 season, and, of course, the reputation of the university’s football program. Tennessee had such a publically difficult time both retaining Kiffin and attracting new coaching talent that the program no longer appears as the elite head coaching job it once did.
USC was not done, either. Kiffin, who brings his famously successful defensive coaching dad Monte with him, nearly lured UCLA offensive coordinator Norm Chow back to Troy. USC turned a vacancy into real, believable momentum.
The quick action to get Kiffin to campus also created an environment that star running back C.J. Gable believes he can thrive in… after nearly turning professional. Southern Cal now sits poised for a competitive season in 2010 with a coach experienced at the school and a top tier recruiting class on its way. It sounds as though not much has changed in Troy… just the name of the desk in the head football coach’s office. Credit the fast-acting athletic department in creating an environment for success regardless of suddenly difficult circumstances. No matter how we feel about Lane Kiffin and his integrity – or lack thereof – and poor treatment of Tennessee, its program and its fans, USC did what was right in the near-term for its program in the face of sudden and difficult events.
It is obvious that USC’s goals were short term preservation in order to keep the university moving forward. Who knows what the long term plans are for USC… or Lane Kiffin. Kiffin may simply be a short term fix while USC quietly seeks out a more stable long-term coach. Or perhaps Kiffin proves he is a short term fix and long term solution – he will have the chance to prove it. Regardless of what USC’s long term plans are, or the overall direction of the major college football coaching landscape (and, yes, I do agree with Jay Paterno), the athletic department did an excellent job at holding the football program together in the near term with the aggressiveness that was necessary.
Good thread. Cheers!!