VOD Not Available
This video is not available.
5 Best Illinois Head Coaching Fits To Replace Bill Cubit
Five best Illinois head coaching fits to replace the now-fired Bill Cubit. Here's who the Fighting Illini should take a look at.
March 5, 2016
Following Bill Cubit’s firing, who are the best options to fill the now-vacant Illinois head coaching position?
There’s never a good time to fire anyone, and no matter how nice you’re trying to be, there’s never a good way to do it other than to give someone as much of a heads-up warning as possible. When you’re a college football head coach, your heads-up warning starts the second you’re hired.
Or if you’re named the head coach of a major American university with a Power 5 football program, and you’re only given a two-year deal for $1.2 million.
Urban Meyer wipes his nose with $1.2 million.
$1.2 million? That’s $0.1 million less than it took Florida State boosters to pay off attorney fees in the Jameis Winston case, and far less than Cubit’s $985,000 buyout.
When Illinois took the interim tag off of Bill Cubit’s status and gave him the ridiculously undervalued contract for a job of that stature, the school was, in essence, giving him a nice severance check. It was an insurance policy to keep a decent coach in place until the hot mess of an athletic department could get its spit together and figure out what it was going to look like when everything settled down.
In steps new athletic director Josh Whitman, and before his coffee got a chance to cool on his first day at the gig, he bounced out Cubit.
Bill Cubit was never going to be the head coach whenever Illinois football became good again, so instead of playing out the string and starting over two years from now, the school reached into its coin purse and officially announced that this was going to be a new era with a new way of doing things.
That’s what new athletic directors do.
And then the new athletic director has to find someone else, and that’s not going to be easy.
By firing Cubit, it’s not about just finding another guy to be the head coach. Whitman has to try to find the guy.
It’s March 5th with spring football kicking into high gear, so the idea of asking someone else’s date to dance is a little difficult. That doesn’t mean Illinois can’t try going after a Group of Five coach somewhere or go after an assistant with an eye on what the program could and should be like in 2018, not necessarily now.
The Best Insta-Fit: Greg Schiano, Ohio State Defensive Coordinator
This is it. This is the guy. This is the hire who’d make the other Big Ten programs freak a bit. This is the one realistic hire Whitman can make to instantly turn Illinois into a thing.
Lost in all the wackiness of his time as the Tampa Bay head coach is that Schiano was one whale of a college coach, and he will be again once he makes the Ohio State defense rock this year.
Sort of like Bobby Petrino’s NFL flameout at Atlanta and issues at Arkansas didn’t take away from his talent, Schiano’s inglorious time in the pros doesn’t diminish what he did for over a decade with the Scarlet Knights.
Remember, Rutgers had one of the worst programs in college football, but over 11 years Schiano built it up into something terrific, coming closer than anyone remembers to being a real, live option in the BCS hunt in 2006 and with six winning seasons in his last seven years before moving on.
This summer he’s only turning 50 – he’s still way young and could make Illinois a destination type of job to turn into his own.
The Most-Interesting Fit: Leslie Frazier, Baltimore Ravens Secondary Coach
This was the big name first thrown around the sewing circle and then twitter, mainly because he has at least some tie to the school – he was the defensive backs coach in the late 1990s – and he’s tight with Whitman. More importantly, he’s a former NFL head coach with the talent and ability to bring a big name to the position and the program. The only real downside is his lack of college coaching history – he’s been a pro coach since 1999 – and there’s still a possible pro head coaching job in his future if he stays the course.
The Gamechanger Fit: Lovie Smith
Does he have the interest and the fire to handle dealing with the college world? He’s going to be 58 when the season starts, and he’s too good a pro coach to not be thinking about another head gig at some point if he waits it out a bit.
Is he going to backslap the boosters? Is he going to be the magnetic personality needed? No and no, but he’s an elite head coach who’d command instant respect. Recruits would line up to play for him.
Right Fit, Won’t Happen: Brock Spack, Illinois State Head Football Coach
He’s just not a big enough or splashy enough hire.
If you’re going to go in a new direction, you need someone a little less Brock Spackey, but in terms of being ready for the gig, he’s absolutely an interesting idea.
The former Purdue linebacker knows the Big Ten, he’s earned his stripes, and he’s proven he can win with a strong seven-year run at Illinois State going 56-29 taking the program to the FCS title game two seasons ago and deep into the playoffs last year.
All that was missing before for him was experience, and if Illinois doesn’t get him, Purdue probably will after Darrell Hazell goes 3-9 this season.
Create Legacy Fit: P.J. Fleck, Western Michigan Head Coach
He somehow survived the last round of coaching hires, but that’s not going to last for long. He still needs seasoning, and there would be some growing pains, but that’s sort of the point. He’s only 35 now – turning 36 this season – and he only has three years of head coaching experience at WMU, but he’s one of the better offensive minds in the game and he knows the territory. The Illinois native went to Northern Illinois and he knows offense. This might be buying the stock a few years early, but there could be a massive payoff.
