Kansas Jayhawks Football

Eyebrows were raised in Lawrence this week when it was announced that not a single assistant coach from Mark Mangino's staff would be retained.

Tuesday, all of Mangino's assistant coaches and strength staff were fired and told to pack up their belongings and leave their offices.

Turner Gill considered retaining Mangino's wide receivers coach, who had orchestrated Kansas’ improved recruiting efforts in Texas the past two seasons, for a day longer, but on Wednesday morning he was fired too.

Oftentimes in head coaching changes in college football, one or two of the best assistant coaches from the previous staff will be kept on to give the sense of positive continuity.

Gill knows this well—he was the only coach retained from the Frank Solich staff by Bill Callahan when he took over the reins in Lincoln. 

Nevertheless, Gill chose not to follow his own example at Kansas—even considering that Mangino's offensive staff guided the most successful offense in school history the last three years.

For all appearances, Gill is moving forward at Kansas with a clean break from Mark Mangino's program. Or not.

Gill's selection of Chuck Long as offensive coordinator is revealing. In many ways, it is a powerful testament to the success of the offensive system that Mangino brought to Kansas eight years ago.

Gill and Long never coached together and have no professional coaching connections. Long did quarterback Iowa from 1982 to 1985 when Gill quarterbacked Nebraska from 1981 to 1983, and they played once head to head in 1982, but other than that they share no past.

From 2000-2005, Long worked for Bob Stoops at Oklahoma as a quarterback coach and later as offensive coordinator. He helped tutor Jason White into becoming a Heisman-winning quarterback. While Long was a quarterback coach at Oklahoma, his other boss was offensive coordinator Mark Mangino, who he successfully served under. The two men worked together for two seasons.

When Mangino left the Sooners to take over at Kansas in 2002, Long filled his shoes at the offensive coordinator position. 

Long had much the same success at Oklahoma as Mangino running a similar system. During Long's tenure the Sooners were 67-11 and won three Big 12 championships, six consecutive bowl games, and a national title.

For those of you who don't remember, Mangino and Long helped to earn Stoops his original nickname of "Big Game Bob," which at the time was intended as a compliment and not used sarcastically like it is today.

During the press conference that introduced Gill as Kansas' new head football coach, he said that little would change in the offense from when Mangino was leading the team. Gill may experiment with using a fullback, but other than that it will be a similar spread philosophy.

What seems to mark the real break from Mangino to Gill on the offensive side of the ball is Gill's implied insistence that Kansas would recruit better under his leadership. During his first press conference, Gill emphasized repeatedly that recruiting would be his staff's top priority at Kansas. By emphasizing this, I felt he was suggesting that he would be able to bring in better talent than Mangino. 

It is possible that Gill will do this, of course, which makes following his progress at Kansas all the more interesting. 

The key point to take away, at least on the offensive side of the ball, is that under Mangino, in Gill's opinion, the shortcomings were not system-related but had to do with the lack of top-notch offensive talent. Perhaps this is the best explanation for why none of Mangino's offensive staff was retained.

It certainly seems that Gill believes he has the right formula to consistently bring highly-ranked players to Kansas, and apparently his new coaching staff will better help him achieve that goal than any members of the old one could.

In an interesting article written today over at FanHouse.com... Tampa Tribune writer, Brett McMurphy claims that the University of South Florida head football coach Jim Leavitt "struck" a player during the half-time session of a regular season game (2009).

See Article here: http://ncaafootball.fanhouse.com/2009/12/14/sources-south-floridas-leavitt-struck-player/1#comments

According to McMurphy the player, sophomore walk-on Joel Miller of Special Teams was approached by Leavitt during a home game against Louisville, during which time the coach "grabbed Miller by the throat and struck him twice."  McMurphy continues to cite various "anonymous sources" who back up Miller's claim and McMurphy's story.

At this point in time, though the subject matter of the "abuse of a student" is no-doubt a serious matter that should be bringing credible witnesses out of the woodwork... no such credible sources have come forward to acknowledge the validity of these claims. 

Further digging revealed that no such evidence of improper conduct from the part of Coach Leavitt has ever occured during his 13 year tenure at the University of South Florida or prior.  However, it did reveal Leavitt's demasculating post-game comments toward... YOU GUESSED IT... Brett McMurphy.

See Video here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbaWrkBhHIY

Following the Louisville game that said events had allegedly occurred, Joel Miller has stated to the press that he wishes to "stay with the USF football" team and continue to play for Coach Leavitt.  Miller's father and former Tampa police officer, Paul Miller, though disgruntled, has no problem with his son's decision. 

Now I'm not a crisis counselor, but that seems like a pretty odd reaction for a family after a child has been choked and beaten.

Being the naive believer that I am... I am sure that Brett McMurphy's spite toward Jim Leavitt has nothing to do with McMurphy's claims and lack of evidence in this article. I am also sure that the fact that this story arising just days after Kansas head coach Mark Mangino resigned due to similar allegations of ill treatment toward players making it a hot topic... is pure coincidence. 

Oh and I am also very sure that I got a really good deal on a really nice bridge that someone sold me.  You know... the one that let's you see both sides.

A lot of Kansas fans are reportedly upset with the Turner Gill hire, thinking that they should have hired a more proven, big name coach. Well I have news for you: a more proven, big name coach isn't coming.

Kansas sent feelers out to Houston Nutt, Jim Harbaugh, even a marginal guy like Tim Brewster and was rejected by them all. Gill was the fallback candidate, and you Kansas fans should be happy that Gill was willing to be a fallback candidate for a program that has only had 18 winning seasons (and those were usually at 6-5 or 7-5!) out of 65 years of playing college football.

And Gill critics, please don't overrate some of the guys that you wanted, especially Jim Harbaugh. It really isn't that hard to win at Stanford. Case in point: Tyrone Willingham had four winning seasons there, and went 5-6 twice . Because of their location and academic reputation, Stanford always has good athletes.

Their problem has been hiring guys like Buddy Teevens and Walt Harris to coach those athletes. Whenever Stanford has a competent coach, they win. Check Stanford's recent recruiting rankings: Harbaugh went 4-8, 5-7, and 8-4 with more talent than Kansas used to go 5-7, 8-5, and 12-1.

So, Kansas fans should be happy to get a coach who successfully pulled off the toughest rebuilding job in the country at Buffalo (who would have had their second winning season in a row had their star RB not missed the season due to injury, and remember Buffalo lost their starting QB to graduation) and has over 10 years of experience as an assistant in the Big 8/Big 12.

It really is the best of both worlds, as Gill's experience as an assistant—including the assistant head coach title—at Big 12 powerhouse Nebraska, and recruiting the types of players that he will need to succeed at Kansas (diamonds in the rough that programs like Texas, Oklahoma and Nebraska will overlook).

There is, however, one issue: the defense. Gill is a certified offense guy, and offense wins games. But defense wins championships. And defense is particularly important in the flag football Big 12 North. As a matter of fact, Nebraska was able to get the Big 12 North title this year simply by having a good defense.

Unless Gill fields a good defense at Kansas, he won't be able to build on what Mangino started, and won't be able to separate Kansas from the other middling programs in "the spread conference." So, the defensive coordinator hire will be key.

And who should Gill hire? None other than a guy very much responsible for a key ingredient to the success in those 1990s Nebraska title games: the dominant defensive lines.

That guy was none other than Tony Samuel , at the time Nebraska's defensive line coach. Samuel left Nebraska to be the head coach at New Mexico State, a rather unwise move, but it showed that Samuel did have ambition and was willing to take a risk.

After that worked out as can be predicted, Samuel landed the head coaching job at an FCS school, Southeast Missouri. Certainly, being a coordinator in the Big 12 is a step up in pay and prestige from being a head coach at a low profiel FCS school.

Plus, Samuel and Gill worked together all those years on Tom Osborne's staff. Finally, coaching at New Mexico State and Southeast Missouri gives Samuel the background in recruiting and coaching the type of defensive talent that Kansas will attract.

Nebraska ran an aggressive, blitz heavy 4-6 defense when Samuel was an assistant, often with big DTs and undersized players at DE and LB, with DBs that were adequate. There is no reason why he can't build a very competitive version of that defense at Kansas.

You may ask "why another Nebraska guy? We are Kansas, not Nebraska. Why should we hire a bunch of Nebraska assistants instead of building our own tradition?" Well, simple: look at Nebraska's tradition in basketball, and look at Kansas. Kansas is actually No. 2 in football in your own state to the program in Manhattan! You should WANT people from a school that actually knows how to build and run a program.

Second, both Gill and Samuel could still be at Nebraska if they wanted to be. They left because they wanted to build their own traditions elsewhere. So Gill and Samuel would be Kansas guys building a Jayhawk football tradition.

So Kansas fans, root for Gill to bring Samuel on as your defensive coordinator. If that happens, it really would go a long way towards making Gill a success at Kansas!

ESPN has reported that the University of Kansas plans to name Buffalo head coach Turner Gill to the vacancy left by Mark Mangino's resignation last week.

According to sources, Gill's daughter, a student at the University of Kansas, recently accepted a position for the Athletics Department and has enjoyed her time at Kansas.

Gill, a former quarterback for the University of Nebraska, has been spurned by some schools in recent years (Nebraska, Auburn) but knows the Big 12 North as well as anyone, and seems to be a quality hire for Kansas Athletic Director Lew Perkins.

Not only has Turner Gill brought Buffalo, a very difficult place to manage by football standards, to national respectability, but he is also a talented recruiter and renowned quarterback mentor.

Kale Pick, Jordan Webb, and Christian Matthews may be more excited than anyone at this hire.

Unfortunately, his resume is not perfect.  The Kansas Jayhawks have struggled on the defensive side of the football in the past two seasons, and defense is a place where Gill has no specific coaching experience to offer.

I am very pleased with the hiring of Gill (the announcement should be released officially by tomorrow) and don't want to shed any negative light on the situation.

However, I feel like defense is a problem Lew Perkins needs to address. 

Clint Bowen alone has been largely unsuccessful as a coordinator, and even the addition of assistant defensive coordinator Bill Miller has had little positive effects for the Jayhawks.

I would personally like to see Bowen demoted to special teams (he was very prominent there), and Louis Matsakis (the current special teams coach) to work only with the scout team (a group among whom he is very popular) from now on. 

Unfortunately, Kansas wouldn't likely hire an extra staff member (especially if Mangino's settlement and Gill's contract are particularly large) in such a fashion. 

Perhaps if I were Perkins, I would try to renegotiate some contracts and/or have the thus-far-ineffective Miller released.

However, I understand that such changes, like most changes I suggest, may be a little ridiculous and are more than unlikely.  I'm also looking awfully far ahead, considering Perkins has not even made a formal statement yet.

What I do know is that Kansas fans can all breathe a little easier now, because no one likes being a team without a coach.

And I think we've bagged a good one.

It is being reported, by ESPN and other sources, that now former head coach at Buffalo Turner Gill is going to be named the next football coach at the University of Kansas .

Coach Gill is a well respected young coach around the college football world. A former player at Nebraska , Gill has experience as both a player and a coach.

As a player, he was a three time Big 8 all-conference quarterback. He was 28-2 as the starter for the Huskers from 1980-83.

As a quarterbacks coach from 1992-2003, Gill oversaw three national championship teams and a Heisman winning quarterback in Eric Crouch. In 2003, he was named assistant head coach, and in 2004 was the wide receivers coach as well.

For the 2005 season, Gill served as the Player Development Director and Offensive Assistant for the NFL's Green Bay Packers.

In 2006, Turner Gill was named the Head Football Coach at the University of Buffalo. In his four seasons as the head man at Buffalo he has posted a 20-30 overall record. While that may not sound all that stellar at first, when taking into account where Buffalo was at before him can change the significance of those numbers.

Buffalo joined the Mid Atlantic Conference in 1999 and had not reached more than three wins until Gill took the helm. Buffalo was not a power when it came to division I-AA either. The eight wins he guided them to last year was one shy of the all time school record.

His win over 12th ranked Ball State to win the MAC Championship was the high point of his Buffalo coaching career.

Now Gill is going to take on the challenge of the Big-12 North, and face the team where he became a star, and saw success at the highest levels as an assistant coach for those three national titles.

While some Kansas fans were hoping for Stanford's Jim Harbaugh, it looks to be a solid hire.

The search for Kansas' new football coach hit a road bump, and then reportedly came to an end this Saturday.  

Stanford's coach Jim Harbaugh told the Associated Press that he will not take the open Kansas coaching job after rumors had linked him for over a week with the vacancy left by Mark Mangino's resignation. 

The Kansas City Star reported Friday that Harbaugh was in talks with KU athletic director Lew Perkins. Several local Kansas City TV and radio stations had also reported Friday night that Harbaugh had been offered the job and was going to be announced as Kansas' new coach as early as Saturday evening.

We will likely never know the full story behind the scenes of what happened between Harbaugh and Perkins, but one thing is clear, Harbaugh is staying put at Stanford.

Harbaugh's public rejection of the reports linking him to Kansas are being interpreted in some quarters as a publicly embarrassing event for Kansas athletic director Lew Perkins and the football program.

Harbaugh would have been widely greeted as a monster hire for the Jayhawks. When the word spread through Lawrence Friday that Harbaugh was close to a deal, fans were elated and lit up local and Kansas City sports talk radio shows with excited calls about the future of Jayhawks football. What they have to say on those same shows on Monday will be interesting to hear.

The news of Harbaugh not coming to Kansas follows the revelation from earlier this week that Lew Perkins' had spoke with Ole Miss' Houston Nutt. After talking with Perkins more than once about the job, Nutt told the media that he would be staying at Ole Miss.

In the last week, three names linked to the Kansas job, Houston Nutt, Tim Brewster, and Jim Harbaugh have all made public statements denying interest in Kansas.

That said, rumors are circulating today that after Harbaugh's rejection, Buffalo's Turner Gill will be named the Jayhawks' next coach. While the news has not been officially confirmed by the university, it seems to be legitimate. 

While Gill will not quite be the rock star hire that Harbaugh would have been, he is a widely respected coach who has strong recruiting ties to Texas and is familiar with the Big 12. 

Many Kansas fans will be wondering if Gill is clearly a better coach than Mark Mangino?  Only time will tell. 

One thing is for certain and that is if Gill is to be officially hired in the next day or two the excitement for him among the fan base will have been dampened somewhat by the false alarm of Jim Harbaugh's coming to Kansas.

College football coaching carousels are somewhat like high school dances. While everyone respects the nerd (think Napoleon Dynamite) that tries to out punt his coverage and asks the prettiest girl in the high school to the dance, when the nerd gets rejected he is put in the awkward situation of having any future dates know that they were only his second, third or fourth choice. 

Kansas and Turner Gill might find themselves in just that position right now.

That said, college football coaching searches are not entirely like high school too. While Kansas' future coach will surely know that he was not their number one choice, he will have at least a million or two dollars per year to console any hurt feelings.

And if it is Gill who will lead the Jayhawks' in 2010, it is my guess that he will be so happy to leave the frozen industrial tundra of western New York and return back to Big 12 North country that he will not mind at all if he was Lew Perkins' second or third choice for the job.

The leading candidate for the head coaching job at the University of Kansas, Jim Harbaugh, has instead opted to sign a three-year extension and stay at Stanford.

The news comes less than a day after media in the Kansas City area reported that Harbaugh would be arriving in town tonight to meet with KU officials and sign a deal. That report was obviously the brain-child of a blindly optimistic KU alum.

It was rumored earlier in the week that Harbaugh could be using the Jayhawks as leverage for a better deal at the Cardinal, and it appears he got one.

Harbaugh would've been an excellent choice to lead the Jayhawks, if Athletic Director Lew Perkins could have reeled him in. After inheriting a one-win team three years ago, the former NFL quarterback led this year's team to an eight-win season, has developed a Heisman worthy running back, and led his team to an upset of perennial Pac-10 contender USC.

The Jayhawks will continue their search, and one of the remaining coaches on their short-list, Buffalo's Turner Gill, has reportedly already publicly announced that he would accept the position if offered.

Gill could be a good fit for the Jayhawks. His daughter, Jordan Gill, is a sophomore at KU and works in the KU Athletic Department. Also, being a former star quarterback in the early 1980s at Nebraska and later an assistant under Head Coach Tom Osborne, Gill is quite familiar with Big 12 country.

Whether Perkins hires Gill or someone else, he can ill afford to have another Harbaugh moment where one of his candidates picks another school over KU. By the time he decides on a coach, he may lose any recruits who were once pondering the thought of signing with KU.

A week into Lew Perkins' quest for a new head football coach at the University of Kansas, the list of potential candidates is growing clearer.

The search has not been without a few curveballs. Pundits were shocked to learn that Perkins had conversations with Ole Miss' Houston Nutt and Minnesota's Tim Brewster.

Both Nutt and Brewster have since said they are not pursuing the job at Kansas anymore.

Where does this leave the list of prospective coaches? Much like it was a week ago, with the one exception of Kevin Sumlin, who is about to sign an extension at Houston. The top remaining names for Kansas are Jim Harbaugh, Skip Holtz, and Turner Gill.

The Kansas City Star reported today that Perkins has talked with all these men, including Stanford head coach Harbaugh. The Star also reported that Harbaugh was likely Kansas' top choice for the job.

This news is very surprising because many people had thought Harbaugh would hold out for an NFL job after he was rumored to be a candidate at Notre Dame and then denied interest in going to South Bend. 

If Harbaugh was not interested in Notre Dame, why would he be interested in Kansas?

Well, it appears now that Harbaugh may actually be seriously considering Kansas. Harbaugh has not yet denied interest in the Kansas position, and his name has been linked with the vacancy for over a week.

The breaking news from the Star today that Harbaugh has spoke with Kansas will certainly put pressure on Harbaugh in Palo Alto to either confirm or deny the report.

It is a fact that Harbaugh has already spoken with Kansas.  This makes it likely that Perkins has already offered him the job. The announcement of Harbaugh's decision is likely pending the completion of the Heisman Trophy presentation, where Harbaugh's player Toby Gerhart is a top contender.

It would be a classy move by Harbaugh to wait until next week if he was leaving Stanford to not distract media attention from Gerhart's run at college football's greatest individual award.

Most people think that Harbaugh would be a home run hire for the University of Kansas. He is a successful, energetic, media-savvy, and "big name" young coach. Harbaugh has star power from his playing career in college with the Michigan Wolverines and in the NFL with the Chicago Bears and Indianapolis Colts.

If hired, Harbaugh would arguably be able to energize the Kansas fanbase and fundraise better than any other coach in Kansas history. 

This thought, especially the idea of a suave and polished coach hauling in the big bucks for the Kansas athletic department, must have athletic director Lew Perkins drooling.

All of these reasons make it the logical conclusion that Perkins has already offered the position to Harbaugh.  If he has not yet, he should immediately.

While Kansas is arguably a "lateral move" from Stanford (or worse), the Jayhawks can compensate Harbaugh to the tune of $2-3 million or maybe even more. The pay at Kansas would be twice the amount of what Harbaugh is speculated to be making at Stanford. Not to mention the fact that the cost of living in Lawrence, Kansas is extraordinarily cheap compared to the Bay Area.  A million dollar home in Palo Alto is relatively a normal house.  In Lawrence, Kansas a million dollar home is a castle.

Only time will tell if Jim Harbaugh is going to be leading the Jayhawks football team into the 2010 season or not. For now, though, Kansas fans and local media are buzzing with the thought of Harbaugh taking over at the helm.  It would make sense if the decision was announced soon, but we will have to see.  Little has made sense this year with Kansas' football program, so maybe that is expecting too much.

If only life were like an NCAA football video game, all of the Kansas Jayhawks' grid-iron problems would be solved.

There would be no rumors, no expenses (other than the 50 bucks or so to buy the game), no staff discrepancies, no bad coordinators, and no unusual Athletic Directors to deal with.

Speaking of which, Lew Perkins wouldn't even need a new head coach; I would simply plop down in front of the television and Playstation 2, begin a dynasty, and create myself. A skinny-built, young faced man sounds about right.

Next, in anticipation of the rebuilding year, I would schedule decently quality and diverse but gradually more-winnable non-conference contests for the 2010 campaign. Maybe I'd throw in a schedule-buster during conference play, just for fun.

Finally, it would be time to get to the real work.

First, I would implement my favorite offense, which like many of us, is the spread.  However, I would use the pistol as my base formation. 

The pistol set-up seems to best-utilize Kansas' diversely talented runningbacks (Toben Opurum, Rell Lewis, and Deshaun Sands) as well as the unique abilities of Kale Pick.  At the same time, Kansas could maintain the no-huddle spread to the benefit of Tim Biere and Kansas' quality receiving corps (including Jonathan Wilson, Bradley McDougald, Chris Omigie, and Erick McGriff in particular).

Unlike a standard shotgun, the pistol provides a greater variety of ground options including isolations, stretches, pitches, counters, draws, and much more. 

Such a game-plan also allows Pick an endless number of opportunities including everything from draws, sprint-outs, and his favored option attack to playaction hand-offs, pitch-fakes, sprint-outs, rollouts, and bootlegs. More importantly, it still gives the young quarterback the benefits of the shotgun and a variety of quick and deeper drop-back options.

Most importantly, a shorter time-frame of activity in the backfield, as opposed to that of a standard shot-gun, seems to suit our smaller, quicker, and experienced offensive line consisting of Tanner Hawkinson, Sal Capra, Jeremiah Hatch, Trevor Marrongelli, and Brad Thorson.

Next, we move on to defense, and this is where I get a bit over the top.

First of all, I would re-implement the 4-2-5 (hey, in video games, it actually works).  Unlike Clint Bowen, however, I would use it properly and utilize Kansas' surplus of youthful talent.

Instead of keeping all three safeties deep or playing the third as a nickelback, I would keep at least one, if not two safeties in or very near the box. Either one of redshirt freshmen Prinz Kande or Dexter Linton, if either is as good as advertised, should be able to manage the deepest middle part of the field himself.

Darian Kelly (redshirt freshman) and Lubbock Smith (sophomore) play like undersized linebackers anyway, but are far more useful in coverage against the popular Big 12 spread offenses. I like the idea of using the slightly larger Kelly as a Polamalu-esque linebacker-safety hybrid, lining up in the box as a weak side 4-3 linebacker of sorts.

Doing so would leave Kansas badly undersized at the linebacker position, assuming Huldon Tharp then moves to the strong side, but the increase of team speed and Smith's ability to skirt in and out of the box make it seem like a worthwhile try.

Drew Dudley would likely land in the middle linebacker role, but should the super-athletic Trayvon Henry hold his commitment to Kansas, he could contribute even more athleticism to the Jayhawk defense immediately.

The Jayhawks feature an endless number of average, inexperienced, or unproven corners to try. I suppose Chris Harris snags one spot, but the other's up for grabs. If JuCo transfer Dave Clark holds his commitment, then he, Anthony Davis, and Daymond Patterson would probably be the front-runners. 

However, (because it's only a video game), I might look to get young guys some valuable experience. Greg Brown (r.So.), Corrigan Powell (r.So., as I believe he took a redshirt this year), D.J. Beshears (So.), and Tyler Patmon (r.Fr.) would all probably get their fair chance as well.

Finally, the front four guys will be difficult ones to choose. I prefer a larger front, so Jake Laptad, Jamaal Greene, a still-growing Richard Johnson, and Quintin Woods would be the likely early favorites.

Once again, though, if things aren't to special, I might as well try a youth movement.  Kevin Young, Tyrone Sellers, and Randall Dent could all play opposite of Jake Laptad, and I would be completely in favor of giving sophomores John Williams and Darius Parish (I believe he took a redshirt this season as well) the opportunity to bring some impressive size to Kansas' interior.

The last and maybe most important facet of my video game coaching plans would involve recruiting.

I would be sure to snag up the great local talents that seem to, more often than not, head South and East. I would strive for quality, not quantity. I would avoid JuCo transfers (no offense) during the early, rebuilding process in particular. Most importantly, I would expand my horizons to recruits everywhere that are interested in Kansas, not just Texas.

I guess the most important idea here is really that I would do the recruiting entirely myself.

But it's too bad, because unfortunately Kansas' situation is far more serious and there is no reset button.

I know I have absolutely no control over what Lew Perkins ultimately decides to do, but at this point I just hope he does it quickly.

Let's get this 'dynasty' started, move on, and start prepping up for next season.

It's been less than a week after Mark Mangino resigned and Kansas's athletic director, Lew Perkins, must already be feeling like the ugly and awkward kid who can't get a date to the high school dance.

Sources connected to Perkins first said he was going after Stanford's Jim Harbaugh.  You should give him credit for shooting high, I guess.  However, it appears Harbaugh is going to stay at Stanford and wait for a NFL job.  Harbaugh also turned down speculation surrounding the Notre Dame vacancy.

After the discussions about Harbaugh, the local Kansas media was surprised when news broke that Lew Perkins had been having "conversations" with Ole Miss' Houston Nutt.  After a day of speculation about this possibility, Nutt came out and said that though Kansas was "appealing" he would be staying at Ole Miss.  Ouch.

Fresh off the Houston Nutt rejection, different media outlets are now reporting that Lew Perkins may be trying to steal away the Minnesota Gophers' head coach, Tim Brewster.

While not quite as strange as the Houston Nutt fiasco, Minnesota athletic director Joel Maturi seemed to verify the speculation yesterday by telling the Twin Cities media that he had a) heard the rumors b) could not guarantee Brewster would be back next year and c) probably wouldn't know anything about it until a deal was finalized with Kansas, so basically quit bothering him with questions. 

This response does not strike me as one that comes from an AD who is very interested in retaining his coach.

While Brewster isn't quite the Tyra Banks of college football, like Houston Nutt, he has had his share of drama in the last three years at Minnesota.  Brewster is 14-23 during those years and he has not been given a contract extension past the five year deal he originally was awarded. 

Many in Minnesota feel the uncertain future of Brewster at Minnesota is hurting recruiting there and recently two recruits have decommitted from the Gophers' after saying the athletic director's reluctance to give Brewster a long term deal made them feel uncertain about the future of the program.

One thing is for sure, many Minnesota fans would view it as a blessing if Kansas took Brewster off their hands.  While Brewster has guided the Gophers to two Insight Bowls in back-to-back seasons, including a defeat by Mangino's Kansas team in last year's bowl, 42-21, he has been unable to make the Gophers more than a poor to mediocre competitor in the Big Ten conference.

Despite playing in a very weak Big Ten conference this year, Brewster's team went 3-5 in conference play including a loss to a horrendous Illinois squad. 

Asides from struggles in the Big Ten, Brewster's Gophers have also had some very embarrassing non-conference debacles during his tenure.  Worst among these would probably be a loss to the North Dakota State Bison.  This season, on Nov. 14, the Gophers almost outdid that defeat by barely putting away the South Dakota State Jackrabbits 16-13.

It would be ironic if Kansas hired away a Minnesota football coach after more than 10 years ago the Gophers' grabbed the Jayhawks' Glen Mason.  Besides any satisfaction that may give fans, I really don't see the sense in this possible hire. 

Nebraska's hiring of Bill Callahan and defensive coordiantor Kevin Cosgrove a few years ago, two guys with Big Ten backgrounds, should really call into question whether or not Big Ten coaches can succeed in the Big 12. 

More relevantly, Brewster does not seem to be an upgrade at all over Mark Mangino.  If anything, it seems to me that it would be a downgrade at the coaching position.