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The coaching carousel is closed. …I hope I didn’t curse him. Today, Bruce Feldman joins us to pull back the curtain on the hiring of UCLA’s head coach. Here we go …
UCLA Recruitment
Bruins make quick move to replace Kelly
Just three days after UCLA head coach Chip Kelly left to become offensive coordinator at Ohio State, the Bruins hired DeShaun Foster as Kelly’s replacement. I know what you’re thinking: wait… how did we get here? Let’s start with a timeline of the past few weeks and the college football job openings he created:
- January 19: Ohio State hires Bill O’Brien, who spent 2023 as the New England Patriots’ offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach, for the same roles in Columbus.
- January 31: Boston College head coach Jeff Hafley is leaving the Eagles to become the defensive coordinator of the Green Bay Packers.
- February 9: Just three weeks after being hired by the Buckeyes, O’Brien is hired as Hafley’s replacement.
- February 9: Ryan Day hires Kelly, an old friend and Day’s former assistant coach at New Hampshire, out of UCLA to lead the Buckeyes’ offense.
- February 12: UCLA hires Foster, a former Bruins star player and assistant coach, as its head coach. Foster recently accepted a job as running backs coach with the Las Vegas Raiders, but opted to return to his alma mater in light of his opening.
Do you have all that? Fortunately, Foster’s hiring should bring closure to the college football coaching carousel, which has remained running much longer than anticipated.
Bruce is here to explain how the UCLA hire came about and how it compares to other hires this cycle:
Feldman Archives
How UCLA landed on Foster
What do you know about UCLA’s recruiting process over the last few days that led Foster to this position?
UCLA AD Martin Jarmond was really looking for someone who had head coaching experience. Initially, according to show sources and an industry source, PJ Fleck of Minnesota was the target of the search and was in Cabo on vacation. Jarmond flew there to meet him. There were several other head coaches in the mix.
You listed Foster as one of your initial candidates to watch. How does UCLA’s interest in him compare to other candidates?
Foster left a few weeks ago to become the Raiders’ running backs coach, and before he left, he had dinner with Jarmond. There, the possibility of Kelly leaving and the job offer were discussed. Jarmond, according to program sources, was candid and told Foster that he preferred someone with head coaching experience, but Foster interviewed him on Friday just after the job opened up. His connection within the program was strong. The players loved him. The staff did the same. He probably won’t cost UCLA a fortune like he would most of the head coaching candidates Jarmond met with. Now, UCLA can take much of the money and redirect it elsewhere.
How do you rate this hire alongside others made in this cycle?
Considering all the timing and circumstance issues, this was a good move for the Bruins. It’s not a flashy hire, but it makes sense on many levels. Now, there will be two big keys: One, who does Foster hire as his OC/play-caller? Second, can you encourage the money people at UCLA to get their NIL operation going? Some schools the Bruins competed with in the Pac-12 had an eight-figure NIL war chest. UCLA didn’t even reach seven figures on that front.
Stewart Mandel also has his coaching qualifications today.
Alma Mater Hires
How successful are alumni-led programs?
Foster will be the ninth active Power 4 head coach to lead his alma mater. Here are the others:
- Brent Key – Georgia Tech, hired in 2023
- Kenny Dillingham – Arizona State (did not play CFB), signed in 2023
- Jeff Brohm – Louisville, hired in 2023
- Mario Cristóbal — Miami, hired in 2022
- Clark Lea — Vanderbilt, hired in 2021
- Kalani Sitake – BYU, hired in 2015
- Kirby Smart – Georgia, hired in 2015
- Mike Gundy – Oklahoma State, hired in 2005
In this transfer-frenzied era of college football, loyalty may seem in short supply. Still, many alumni are emerging as candidates for head coaching vacancies, even as alumni-led programs have a mixed bag of success. Something like David Shaw at Stanford falls into mediocrity either Scott Frost in Nebraska just doesn’t work while others like Jim Harbaugh at Michigan pays off with titles. We may be on the verge of a trend, as the last three national championships were won by coaches leading their alma maters (Smart in 2021 and 2022, Harbaugh in 2023). That hasn’t happened since Phillip Fulmer led Tennessee to a championship in 1998. by ESPN.
A 2019 investigative story from ABC’s Five Thirty-Eight He dove into the success rate of alumni-led college football programs. From 1975 to 2018, there were 146 alumni head coaches. Those coaches won 52.6 percent of their games, while non-alumni head coaches won 51.1 percent of their games. The moral of the story is that you can’t necessarily predict the success of a program based on whether it is student-led.
Overall, does hiring an alumnus as head coach feel like a safe move with few upsides or a big change that could go either way? Tell us your opinion in survey from today until Saturday. We will share the results on Thursday.
Quick Snapshots
Recently hired Washington coach Jedd Fisch joined the Until Saturday podcast to discuss his controversial departure from Tucson.
Michigan writer Austin Meek took a deep dive yesterday into what he did Sherron Moore Michigan’s only option for replace harbaugh. It’s a new era in Ann Arbor and Austin is setting the stage.
Deion Sanders did not conduct a complete overhaul of its roster as it did last year, but Colorado It still enters 2024 with new pieces in its roster and personnel. As Year 2 begins, one of college football’s most talked-about coaches says, “We made some noise, but now we’re going to make some sounds.”
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(Top photo by DeShaun Foster: Jordon Kelly/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)