New names

[Harry]

Ok, here are some new names that haven't yet been discussed on here:

Larry Fedora - Oklahoma State Offensive Coordinator/ Fedora is a wide open offensive coach that came to OSU from Florida. Outstanding recruiter. Could have followed Zook to Illinois or joined Urban Meyers staff at Florida. Break out the checkbook because this guy is pretty special and will be pretty hard to lure away from OSU.

Jimbo Fisher - LSU Offensive Coordinator - Another bright future BCS caliber head coach that will be very difficult to lure away from LSU and the BCS head coaching track.

Pat Sullivan - UAB Offensive Coordinator - I am not a big Sullivan fan because of his days at TCU but he is a respected offensive coordinator and could be in the mix. He's older now and does not fit the mold of the young/handsome (Mike Gundy, Urban Meyer etc) BCS coach. I would think he would be interested in coming to UNT.

Tyke Tolbert - Buffalo Bills WR Coach - We have not discussed NFL assistants much here but there are a lot of good ones and only so many NFL head coaching jobs to go around. Tolbert played ball and coached at LSU and I am guessing he was there around the same time RV and Dickey were. He is a young, energetic african american that is known as an outstanding coach and recruiter.

Freddie Kitchens - Dallas Cowboy TE's Coach - Hard to believe that our former running backs coach could be in the running for this job. Kitchens has built an impressive resume in a very short time (he is only 31). North Texas players and fans liked Kitchens when he was here and it is not out of the realm of possibility that he could be back. Kitchens took the Cowboys job after Todd Dodge turned it down.

You might ask why would NFL assistants and coordinators at major college programs be interested in a head coaching job at North Texas. The reality is that other coaches have taken head coaching gigs at mid major programs and parlayed them into bigger and better opportunities. A great example of this would be Urban Meyer. Meyer was an assistant at Notre Dame when he took the Bowling Green job. He spent two years at Bowling Green and jumped over to Utah which eventually landed him one of the best jobs in America coaching the Gators of Florida. The reality was that Meyer probably would have been passed over for the Notre Dame head coaching position and by taking a chance at Bowling Green he was able to get where he wanted to go. Oh by the way, Notre Dame tried to convince him to come back there and be the head coach after he had already accepted the Florida job and he turned them down :-).

The more I study this, the more it becomes apparent to me that we need a guy that is looking for bigger and better things. I believe that an NFL assistant or an upwardly mobile assistant at a BCS level program would be ideal. This coach needs to be here 2-3 maybe 4 years at the most. We need to find another Urban Meyer and I realize that is not very easy to do. I just hope and pray that the administration realizes this too and is willing to up the ante where we can get a coach of this caliber. The bottomline is this, we need this coach to help us get into Conference USA. I truly believe that this can happen in the next 2-3 years.

The only outlier in my analysis is Todd Dodge. He is an enigma, because he is basically making the jump up from high school and because of that is a risk. If we were to convince a say Larry Fedora to take this job, then it would be less risky than Dodge. If we can't find a Larry Fedora or similar type of caliber coach, and had to settle for a Pat Sullivan then I would be more inclined to go with Dodge. I think guys like Carthel and Mickey Matthews are good coaches but would not be ideal candidates for our particular situation. My guess is both of them would rather retire in their current situations than to come here and deal with the pressure of what we are needing to get accomplished in such a short time frame.

[Harry]

One last note. We should not be afraid of being told no. In fact, if we have not been told no a lot in the next couple of weeks then we probably aren't asking the right people. I know people want us to get back in the recruiting hunt as soon as possible but I would rather lose a year of recruiting to take our time and land the right guy.

[yyz28]

One last note.  We should not be afraid of being told no.  In fact, if we have not been told no a lot in the next couple of weeks then we probably aren't asking the right people.  I know people want us to get back in the recruiting hunt as soon as possible but I would rather lose a year of recruiting to take our time and land the right guy.

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I totally agree with this!