[NU Sports] 08.31.06 (fwd)

[Mike Nolan]

> In the next few days, we must now look to the future, or at least the 2006
> season. Who will be our coach? Will Mark Murphy and Jerry Brown shepherd the
> team through this season and hope to hire someone during the normal cycle next
> off season? I would think with only two months until our first kickoff the list
> of available head coaches would be rather short. Any thoughts?

One of the cruel lessons that sports teaches us, far too often, is that
life goes on even in the face of tragedy.

Realistically, there are five sets of choices:

1.  Hire a head coach away from another school

2.  Hire an assistant coach who is ready to become a head coach away 
    from another school

3.  Name a current member of the staff the interim head coach

4.  Name a current member of the staff the new head coach

5.  Hire a retired or out-of-work former head coach, either on an interim 
    basis or as the new head coach.

Options 1 and 2 both suffer from timing problems, this is a bad time to
try hiring someone away from another school.  Also, do we really want as 
our next coach someone who is willing to abandon his current school and 
contract a few weeks before fall camp?  

Option 3 may be the best or at least the most flexible choice, though it 
is not without risks.  The interim head coach would surely have a leg up 
on being named the new permanent head coach, especially if he starts out
the 2006 season with a few wins, but he might leave if he doesn't get the 
job, regardless of whether the new head coach wants him to stay on the 
staff or not.

Option 4 is probably the second best choice, but given the coaching 
departures since the end of the season the choices are a bit slim, and
why rush the naming of a new head coach if it's an in-house replacement?

With regards to both 3 and 4, if Pat Fitzgerald is, as some have speculated,
the coach of the future for NU, maybe the future is now.  How many first-time
head coaches in the last 20 years have never served as either an OC or a 
DC before moving up?  Not many, I suppose.

Option 5 would be a very mixed blessing.  Yeah, there are some big names out
there, like Gary Barnett and Rick Neuheisel (or is he still coaching with
the Ravens?)  Personally, I don't want Gary Barnett back, the taste from
his departure is still too bitter.  And nobody else, not even Ricky, rings
my bell, not even Tom Osborne, who having lost in the primary for his
bid to be the Governor of Nebraska, is probably available at the moment.

Moreover, since he's in his 60's and has little to prove on the football 
field, he could be the type of one-year (or less) placekeeper appointment 
that NU might find attractive.
--
Mike Nolan