December 07, 2004

Ole Miss "Reshuffles" Coaching Search; Chancellor Speaks Openly

Scratch Ron Zook and Bobby Petrino from the coaching candidate list at Ole Miss. Zook is poised to accept the Illinois head coaching position today, and Ole Miss officials were notified that Petrino was no longer interested in the Rebels' job. Both coaches had shown initial interest in the position, unlike Urban Meyer and Ty Willingham, who each rebuffed initial inquiries.

The search in Oxford--which officials hope to conclude by the end of this week--appears to be narrowing down to USC assistant head coach Ed Orgeron and former Washington coach Rick Neuheisel. Ole Miss has spoken to USC about Orgeron, but reports of contact with Neuheisel are unconfirmed.

In a manner which should please football fans too often frustrated by searches cloaked in silence and filled with incorrect media reporting, Ole Miss chancellor Robert Khayat and athletics director Pete Boone have surprisingly open about this search and its twists and turns. They spoke in detail about the exchanges with Zook and with Petrino's agent.

Regarding Petrino:

Boone said Petrino's agent called him last week saying the coach might be interested in the job. Boone said he then got another call Sunday from the agent, who said Petrino was no longer interested.

"I said, 'Why are you telling me this? We haven't even talked about a job. You're the one coming to us about the possibility he might be interested,' " Boone said on the radio show. "I said, 'This is all new to me.' We didn't instigate anything. All we did was call back when we were called."

This exchange, coupled with last season's Auburn fiasco, may make it more difficult for the Louisville coach to move in the future.

Regarding Neuheisel, Khayat was intially reluctant to include him in the search, but now appears to be warming to the former Colorado and Washington coach as the Rebels' options become more limited.

About NCAA scandals (and implicitly about Neuheisel):

'We want a coach who has a reputation for integrity, for proper behavior,'' Khayat said. ''We don't expect a coach to be perfect, so that person could have some sort of a personal mistake in his past. But if there's reason to believe that situation doesn't exist anymore, we believe in forgiveness. A clean slate with the NCAA is critical. That's pretty much a line in the sand.''

It is unclear whether the open nature of this search will yield a quality hire, but it must be relieving for fans to have at least a clue about what is going on.

Posted by Robert Knodell

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Comments & Trackbacks

1. From etouffee.org

   pinged on Dec 7, 2004 12:26 PM

   Ole Miss can't seem to find anyone interested in their coaching job, either. Last week it was down to Ron Zook and Bobby Petrino, with Zook looking almost like a sure thing. But both coaches have since said "not interested". Now the r...

2. dave frey says:

   posted on December 7, 2004 02:11 PM — link

   Sounds to me like laying the groundwork for a Neuheisel hire, but I really don't see him as an Oxford, Mississippi kinda guy.

3. Rob Knodell says:

   posted on December 7, 2004 02:27 PM — link

   I think Rick might actually mesh well in Oxford. Ole Miss football (and least in its own lore and gamedays traditions) has sort of a preppy and stylish accent to it that fits Neuheisel well. I think he would fit better there than in a more hyper-macho football environment like Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, or Tennessee.

   Rick is so creative and "out-of-the-box" in the way he operates that I doubt he'd succeed in an environment with a winning tradition where a coach is constantly scrutinized and compared to a Bear Bryant, Vince Dooley, Steve Spurrier, or the like. Ole Miss is simply hungry to contend in the SEC. I doubt they really care how it is done.

4. From Signifying Nothing

   pinged on Dec 8, 2004 6:33 PM

   Not much seems to have changed from yesterday’s account by Robert Knodell at the SEC Fanblog, although today’s Clarion-Ledger reports that USC (that’d be the one in California, not the one in the Carolinas) assistant Ed Orgeron really wants the...

5. From SEC College Football - Fanblogs.com

   pinged on Dec 14, 2004 6:52 PM

   Despite conflicting reports throughout the weekend and through today regarding the candidacy of San Francisco 49ers head coach Dennis Erickson, Ole Miss officials are flying to the Bay Area to interview him. The (Jackson, MS) Clarion-Ledger has reporte...