Getting a feeling that Charlie Strong will be honoring his commitment to remain as the head football coach at the University of Louisville.
A Texas A&M blog is reporting that U of L refused a request to allow that school to interview Strong, which has to be false. Tom Jurich would never deny a member of his staff the ability to consider personal growth opportunities. More likely that Strong wasn’t interested.
Whether A&M fits in the growth category is debatable. A good school with a solid football tradition but its future in the SEC is going to be challenging for whoever takes that job. A&M has reportedly conducted extensive interviews with Kevin Sumlin of Houston and Larry Fedora of Southern Mississippi.
Fedora is also flirting with North Carolina, which could mean that Sumlin is the prime candidate for the A&M post.
Meanwhile, Mississippi has announced the hiring of Hugh Frieze, formerly at Arkansas State, at its new head coach. Penn State has an alleged list of candidates that, according to some sources doesn’t include Charlie Strong, an indication that the clueless may still be in charge at Happy Valley.
But as Bobby Petrino has taught us, this stuff is never over, departing U of L one day after the biggest win in the school’s history in the BCS Orange Bowl in 2007.
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The Big East seems to have arrived at its final list of expansion candidates but has taken its time making the big announcement, expected Wednesday. The guess here is that part of the holdup may have been negotiations over exit arrangements for Syracuse, Pittsburgh and West Virginia.
The exit fees for West Virginia should be at least twice as much as the two other schools for all the bridge burning WVU has done in the past couple months. Always playing with fire, those Mountaineers.
Looks like Boise State, Houston, San Diego State, Central Florida and Southern Methodist for now. Navy and Air Force are still possible but they have the military bureaucracy to work through and that could take forever.
Boise State and Houston would be bringing top 20 rankings from this season with them, a big plus for the Big East, and Louisville if that’s where the future lies.
Steady as we forge ahead!