Let me be clear, I never thought Greg Schiano would be a great hire for Tennessee when news began to leak this weekend. And that has nothing to do with what role he may have played at Penn State scandal.
Schiano has a 68-67 record in college football, all at Rutgers. His record is impressive considering where he coached, but not overwhelming. Still, an 11-win season in 2006 garnered him several coach of the year awards. Then he was fired after an 11-21 record as the head coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Compared to who had been rumored for the UT job, Schiano had all the sizzle of a bag of ice.
I personally lost all respect for Schiano when he was a no-show during a recruiting visit to Don Bosco Preparatory School. His assistants were at the school unaware that he had already accepted the head coaching position with the Bucs.
However, the notion that the uproar around Schiano was based mainly on his alleged child molestation cover up at Penn State was a convenient way for UT fans to swiftly reject him. Personally, it would trouble me if Schiano was hired for the Nittany Lion connection. It would also give me pause if Schiano were hired and my son was considering UT as a college football prospect.
The head coaching position at Tennessee shouldn’t be filled by a candidate with such baggage. However, his involvement with the cover up at Penn State is unproven and perhaps completely untrue. If this type of flimsy allegation were tied to Chip Kelly, Bob Stoops or Jon Gruden, there wouldn’t have been outrage on Sunday. Fans would have celebrated the hire.
The mistake that UT athletic director Jon Currie made in tabbing Schiano for the job was that he has no SEC knowledge and has rarely recruited big-time players, especially in the south Moreover, a coach with knowledge of Schiano told me that his players strongly disliked him, which is what we have recently learned about former UT coach Butch Jones. It would have been a bad hire even if Schiano had never even stepped foot in State College. UT fans surmised as much and the outcry now has Currie looking for another coach after he decided he couldn’t hire Schiano based on the fan reaction.
The response either makes Currie look weak or out of touch with his fan base. I’ll let you decide. If Schiano was hired, there would have been talk of the Penn State connection for a few days. Then it would have died down. By most, Schiano would be beloved by UT’s fans the way every fan base welcomes in a new coach. However, one booster told me he’d never attend another game nor make any donations if Schiano were hired. Winning would cure some of that but not all.
What further frustrated fans is that interesting names like Washington State head coach Mike Leach and Washington head coach Chris Petersen came up late last week. Those are both more intriguing than Schiano by a long shot. Petersen seems like a bit of a reach. Leach, however, seemed attainable, at least before Sunday.
Now, if I’m a coach and UT comes calling, I’m not so sure that’s where I want to be. Currie proved he wasn’t connected with his fan base with the Schiano fiasco. Just what would a coach be stepping into? By the looks of it, a dumpster fire.
