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Thanksgiving Day weekend was busy on the coaching carousel as Wisconsin and Nebraska hired a new head coach while Cincinnati, Texas State and FAU entered the job market.
Stay up to date on Coaching Changes, including moves on Sunday and Monday at Western Michigan, Tulsa, UNLV and Arizona State, which are not represented below.
Late Monday afternoon (eastern time), Auburn officially announced the hiring of Liberty head coach Hugh Freeze who had been signed to an 8-year extension in October.
Also as of late Monday, Deion Sanders had not been announced as going anywhere. However, he has confirmed he has been contacted by several schools, including Colorado, while not saying whether or not his departure from Jackson State is something he wants to do.
Barry Odom could he headed to Tulsa.
Rumors on Monday said Willie Fritz may be leaving Tulane for Georgia Tech. We said we would be shocked and disappointed if it was confirmed and announced before this week's American Conference championship game which Tulane will host against UCF. On Tuesday, Georgia Tech announced that Brent Key will stay as head coach and have the interim tag removed.
Wisconsin on Sunday, November 27th, announced the hiring of Cincinnati head coach Luke Fickell to the same position with the Badgers. During Fickell's four-year run in Cincinnati, he accumulated a 57-18 record over-all and a conference mark of 35-11 while claiming back-to-back American Athletic Conference titles in 2020 and 2021. The Bearcats also played in the 2019 championship game and lost, and were in the hunt once again in 2022 until Tulane's 27-24 upset win at Cincinnati on November 26 in the final game of the regular season. His biggest accomplishment was leading Cincinnati into the College Football Playoff in 2021 when his team went 13-0 before losing to Alabama in the semifinal round..
Cincinnati will be led by Kerry Coombs for the bowl season, a long-time assistant in college and the NFL who just joined Fickell's staff for the 2022 season after being let go by Ohio State. He has mostly served as a special teams and defensive backs coach.
Wisconsin played the final 7 games of the 2022 season under interim head coach Jim Leonhard. Minds were blown on Sunday (October 2) when the completely unanticipated news began peppering Twitter that Wisconsin had fired Paul Chryst after a 2-3 start. Chryst was 67-26 during his 7-plus seasons in Madison with three Big Ten west division titles, He was 43-18 in conference games and had a 6-1 bowl record. Defensive coordinator Jim Leonhard was immediately named interim head coach. Some compared the move to Nebraska's decision to fire Frank Solich after the 2003 season when he went 9-3 and was 58-19 over-all. The 'Huskers are now on their sixth coach since making that move and none have equaled his winning percentage at Nebraska of .753. Solich went on to become a legend at Ohio University before retiring prior to the 2001 season with a 173-101 career record.
Texas State announced the firing of Jake Spavital on Sunday, November 27, after his four seasons in San Marcos only produced marks of 13-35 over-all and 9-23 in the Sun Belt. The Bobcats were 4-8 in 2022.
David Shaw resigned has the head coach of Stanford on Saturday night, November 26, after the Cardinal had finished their 3-9 season with a 35-26 loss at home to BYU. He was 96-54 in 12 seasons with a conference mark of 65-40. Shaw is the only four-time Pac-12 Coach of the Year, having led the Cardinal to three conference titles and 8 bowl games in his first 8 seasons. The program had slipped to 14-28 over the last four seasons. Shaw's 96 overall wins rank ninth in Pac-12 history while his 65 conference victories rank fifth. Stanford achieved 29 wins against top-25 opponents (ranking eighth nationally since 2011), 11 against top-10 programs and five against top-5 foes. Additionally, the Cardinal had 43 players drafted, a total ranking tied for 13th nationally and tied for the most in the Pac-12.
Willie Taggart, somewhat surprisingly, was let go by FAU on Saturday night, November 26. The move came shortly after the Owls had suffered a 32-31 loss at home to Western Kentucky in overtime when the Hilltoppers successfully went for two points after a touchdown. The loss kept FAU from becoming bowl eligible at 5-7. He was 15-18 over-all at the Boca Raton school and 11-11 in Conference USA play. Taggart previously held the HC job at Western Kentucky from 2009-2012, USF from 2013 to 2016, Oregon in 2017 and Florida State from 2018 through the first 9 nine games of 2019. He was the first African-American to hold the position at all four schools. His career record is 71-80 with 5 bowl bids. in 13 seasons. He didn't coach in 3 of those 5 bowls as he had moved on to his next stop. He was 0-2 in the two bowls in which he did perform the HC duties.
Nebraska on Saturday (November 26) named former Carolina Panthers, Baylor Bears, and Temple Owls head coach Matt Rhule as the official replacement of Scott Frost who was dismissed on September 11, the day after a 45-42 loss at home to Georgia Southern dropped the 'Huskers to 1-2. It was the 8th straight to FBS teams, all by single digits. He left the school with records of 16-31 over-all and 10-26 in conference games. Frost was hired after leading UCF to marks of 19-7 over-all and 12-4 in American Conference play over the course of the 2016 and 2017 seasons. His career record now stands at 35-38. Mickey Joseph was named interim head coach and went 3-6 for the rest of the season.
Rhule took over a Baylor program that went 1-11 in 2017 and led the Bears to a 6-win improvement in 2018. For an encore, his 2019 squad went 11-3 with just one regular season loss to Oklahoma, another loss to the Sooners in the Big 12 Championship game and a Sugar Bowl bowl loss to Georgia. Unfortunately for Baylor fans, that performance caught the attention of NFL teams and Rhule was hired on January 7 as the new head coach at Carolina. At Baylor, Rhule repeated the turnaround success he had at Temple where his first two team was 1-11, but his next three seasons saw the Owls go a cumulative 26-13.