The Monarchists

MORE Sun Belt Coaching Carousel…with MORE Grades!

David Asbury

Who would have thought that drafting a blog on the coaching carousel in February would be too early?  But my original post on the coaching carousel is now dated.

NIL, transfer portal, and conference realignment is changing the college football world and some coaches are not really happy about it.  Will Hall at Southern Miss. recently said that he does “zero football” and spends all of his time fundraising for NIL opportunities with the ultimate goal of retaining talent from the much wealthier P5 schools.  The wealth disparity between the G5 and P5 (or is it P4?  P2?) is also getting bigger and giving G5 head coaches other options.  Why spend all your time fundraising when you can have a less stressful job coaching the tight ends at a P5 school and yet still make a comparable salary?  For example in the Sun Belt, Kane Wommack left a head coaching job at South Alabama to be Alabama’s offensive coordinator.  But most surprisingly was that Chip Kelly resigned coaching UCLA, a P5 school, to be an offensive coordinator at the wealthier Ohio State University.  It appears the job of being a head coach is now more akin to being a general manager in the NFL than an actual coach and some coaches did not sign up for that.  So things are getting a little weird.

Anyways, here’s some more movement:

Georgia State

Shawn Elliott left Georgia State-two days into spring practice-to be the tight ends coach at South Carolina.  His results in Atlanta have been mixed, posting a 41-44 record with the Panthers.  However, no one can dispute his bowl record which is an impressive 4-1 in seven seasons.  The Panther hopeful were stunned and disappointed by him taking a job that many consider to be demotion.

He said the decision was a no-brainer.  He takes a $60k pay cut to “only ” make $750k per year but his new job has less responsibility.  Most importantly for him it is much closer to home.  When he took the GSU position he left his family behind in a move they all felt was the best. Over the last seven years, Elliott has commuted up and down I-20 to be with his family as much as possible.  Meanwhile, in 2024 the Georgia State roster must be rebuilt.  In returning production from last year it ranks 131st of 133 teams.  So Elliott leaves behind a lot of work for the new coach.

Dell McGee is an experienced assistant coach and Georgia native.  After a playing career with the Arizona Cardinals, NFL Europe and the original XFL (yeah he’s 50 years old) he worked up the high school coaching ranks to be an assistant at Georgia Southern from 2014-2015.  As an interim head coach, he led the Eagles to victory in the 2015 GoDaddy Bowl against Bowling Green.  So he already starts his head coaching career with an undefeated 1-0 record.  Since then, he has served as running backs coach, run game coordinator and assistant head coach for UGA, winning national championships in 2021 and 2022.  He has never called plays on offense or defense but likely will not have to at State.  For the first moves in filling out his coaching staff, he hired Jim Chaney and Kevin Sherrer to serve as Offensive Coordinator and Defensive Coordinator.  Both have lots of experience and Georgia connections.  McGee knows Georgia, he knows the Sun Belt, and he knows how to win.  Just give him a few seasons to rebuild the team though.  Grade A+.

Georgia Southern (Offensive Coordinator)

Bryan Ellis resigned as the Eagles offensive coordinator to become Alabama’s tight ends coach (yeah, another one).  Ellis led a really high-powered offense in both 2022 with quarterback Kyle Vantrese and again in 2023 with quarterback Davis Brin.  Georgia Southern finished 9th nationally in passing yards per game in 2023 (304.7).  His offense often carried the poor Eagles defense to victories.  Clay Helton wasted no time in naming his replacement.

Ryan Aplin spent the last two seasons as the team’s tight ends coach and pass game coordinator.  In that role he helped Southern transition from a triple-option to their current spread offense.  Hiring internally was probably the right move this late in the process and will hopefully have little change to the system.  But losing Ellis who has been so great for this Southern Offense and hiring internally can only feel like a downgrade.  Grade C.

Old Dominion (Wide Receivers)

In my last article I gave ODU a B grade for hiring a new Tight Ends Coach David Weeks and Wide Receivers Coach from Western Carolina, JJ Laster.  Well, they come and they go. Pittsburgh poached Laster upon his arrival to ODU while his bags were still packed.  So ODU quickly found a replacement and it is a good one.

Kody Cook will now coach ODU’s wide receivers.  Upon finding out he got the job, he immediately packed his bags and drove through the night to arrive in Norfolk.  He played wide receiver/emergency quarterback at Kansas State when ODU’s defensive coordinator, Blake Seiler, was coaching there.  So he must be a good personality fit. While at Kansas State he was called up to play emergency quarterback and performed surprisingly well considering that he was a wide receiver.

After college, he coached wideouts at Hutchinson Community College, which is one of the top producers of JUCO talent.  He helped develop wide receivers such as Malik Benson of Alabama/FSU.  This JUCO experience will likely be an asset to developing underclassmen receivers.  But most importantly, he comes from Tennessee as a Graduate Assistant.  ODU runs the same offensive scheme as Tennessee, which some call the “Tennessee Wide Splits.”  Cook is young, may need recruiting experience, and has never been a position coach at this level of play, but other than that it is a homerun hire.  Grade A-.