We have a major hole to fill at offensive coordinator. I thought I'd try to identify some ideas of who we could look at:
Andy Ludwig (former Utah OC) mostly did a good job at Utah, where it's difficult to coexist with Whittingham, before the offense imploded last year
Tyler Bowen (Ohio State OL coach) did a mediocre job in three years as Virginia Tech's OC and has a ton of position coaching versatility that could help bridge for us
Brennan Carroll (Oakland Raiders OL coach) was rising following big success at Arizona before things didn't go so well at Washington
Josh Henson (Purdue OC) is the credible recent USC OC who is coaching at the one power program we could maybe say with a straight face we're a step up from, though our pitch may depend on getting a credible head coach
Robert Anae (former OC for NC State, Syracuse, Virginia, and BYU) is a very credible coordinator with a lot of experience against the teams on our schedule who may or may not want to take on our headache at the end of his career
Josh Gattis (former OC for Maryland, Miami, Michigan) has fallen on hard times but had a good year in one of his two years at Maryland and did a good job at Michigan before the failed year at Miami
Kasey Dunn (former Oklahoma State OC) was let go after a very long time in Stillwater and a mediocre five years as the OC, has a lot of previous ties closer to our neck of the woods and we could probably do worse
Alex Atkins (LSU run game coordinator/OL coach) was scapegoated for Florida State's season and lost his OC/OL job there after his three years there were the best, second best, and worst of the last eight years of Seminole offensive football
Eric Bieniemy (Chicago Bears RB coach) is one of the biggest OC names in the sport and we could try to buy low, though probably not a culture fit
Dirk Koetter (former all kinds of NFL and college head coach and OC) just retired apparently out of fatigue with NIL/portal world and it's basically impossible to imagine him taking on our challenge in light of that, but if Luck is going to supposedly bring juice and swing big shots I should probably mention Koetter
Tim Cramsey (Memphis OC) has them doing better than he inherited, which is also a pattern he had at Marshall
Jordan Davis (North Texas OC) is a wunderkind (32) who has done a nice job at North Texas through two years
Nick Petrino (Missouri State OC) just delivered a great offensive year without his dad's help a couple years removed from dad moving on
Jake Landry (Iowa State RB coach) just moved up to FBS after a year as North Dakota State's OC and a few at St. Thomas
Anthony Soto (Mercer OC) is a young (mid-30s) Northern California guy who has been capably working his way up the lower-level coaching ranks, with OC stints at Mercer and Lenoir-Rhyne
Connor McQueen (Oakland Raiders quality control coach) was just recently the Incarnate Word OC and is collecting impressive mentors, at 31 having already having worked for Chip Kelly and Lincoln Riley and now going back to work for Kelly on Pete Carroll's staff
Cody Hawkins (Idaho State head coach) is an FCS head coach and won more in his second year than the first so he's probably silly to include, but we have seen in this new environment some coaches deciding that a power coordinator job is better than a lesser head coach job and Hawkins is somebody whose offense was quite good last year
Dino Babers (former Syracuse head coach and Arizona OC, and very long ago Texas A&M OC) may make more sense for us as a head coach than OC and probably isn't super attractive for either but he's worth mentioning as a notable unemployed guy
Tyler Walker (Temple OC) parlayed success at Montana State into a major college football OC job and we could try to poach him from the Owls before even coaching a game, though he has a very thin resume compared to others on this list
Danny Freund (Washington State OC) hitched a ride with his head coach at South Dakota State to move up a level and maybe we could try to poach him from the Cougs before even coaching a game, much more established resume than Walker
Josh Davis (Fresno State OC) parlayed success at South Dakota into a major college football OC job.....you know where I'm going with this
Jim Chapin (Central Michigan OC) parlayed success at North Dakota into a major college football OC job.....
Luke Schleusner (New Mexico OC) hitched a ride with his head coach at Idaho to move up a level, but the offensive trajectory at Idaho was poor so this one doesn't jump out
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The first ten names would be serious Power Four program kind of people to go after but there are others like Davis and Petrino I'd be intrigued by.
Of course not an exhaustive list, just some people whose resumes struck me as credible and whose current employment or lack thereof made me think we could make a play. I did this because it's driving me crazy that we don't have a head coach or offensive coordinator or QB coach, but this is somewhat cart before the horse with needing to know the plan for head coach. A head coach, whether interim or permanent, would have his own vision and network and potentially skillset to be the OC like Taylor was.
Andy Ludwig (former Utah OC) mostly did a good job at Utah, where it's difficult to coexist with Whittingham, before the offense imploded last year
Tyler Bowen (Ohio State OL coach) did a mediocre job in three years as Virginia Tech's OC and has a ton of position coaching versatility that could help bridge for us
Brennan Carroll (Oakland Raiders OL coach) was rising following big success at Arizona before things didn't go so well at Washington
Josh Henson (Purdue OC) is the credible recent USC OC who is coaching at the one power program we could maybe say with a straight face we're a step up from, though our pitch may depend on getting a credible head coach
Robert Anae (former OC for NC State, Syracuse, Virginia, and BYU) is a very credible coordinator with a lot of experience against the teams on our schedule who may or may not want to take on our headache at the end of his career
Josh Gattis (former OC for Maryland, Miami, Michigan) has fallen on hard times but had a good year in one of his two years at Maryland and did a good job at Michigan before the failed year at Miami
Kasey Dunn (former Oklahoma State OC) was let go after a very long time in Stillwater and a mediocre five years as the OC, has a lot of previous ties closer to our neck of the woods and we could probably do worse
Alex Atkins (LSU run game coordinator/OL coach) was scapegoated for Florida State's season and lost his OC/OL job there after his three years there were the best, second best, and worst of the last eight years of Seminole offensive football
Eric Bieniemy (Chicago Bears RB coach) is one of the biggest OC names in the sport and we could try to buy low, though probably not a culture fit
Dirk Koetter (former all kinds of NFL and college head coach and OC) just retired apparently out of fatigue with NIL/portal world and it's basically impossible to imagine him taking on our challenge in light of that, but if Luck is going to supposedly bring juice and swing big shots I should probably mention Koetter
Tim Cramsey (Memphis OC) has them doing better than he inherited, which is also a pattern he had at Marshall
Jordan Davis (North Texas OC) is a wunderkind (32) who has done a nice job at North Texas through two years
Nick Petrino (Missouri State OC) just delivered a great offensive year without his dad's help a couple years removed from dad moving on
Jake Landry (Iowa State RB coach) just moved up to FBS after a year as North Dakota State's OC and a few at St. Thomas
Anthony Soto (Mercer OC) is a young (mid-30s) Northern California guy who has been capably working his way up the lower-level coaching ranks, with OC stints at Mercer and Lenoir-Rhyne
Connor McQueen (Oakland Raiders quality control coach) was just recently the Incarnate Word OC and is collecting impressive mentors, at 31 having already having worked for Chip Kelly and Lincoln Riley and now going back to work for Kelly on Pete Carroll's staff
Cody Hawkins (Idaho State head coach) is an FCS head coach and won more in his second year than the first so he's probably silly to include, but we have seen in this new environment some coaches deciding that a power coordinator job is better than a lesser head coach job and Hawkins is somebody whose offense was quite good last year
Dino Babers (former Syracuse head coach and Arizona OC, and very long ago Texas A&M OC) may make more sense for us as a head coach than OC and probably isn't super attractive for either but he's worth mentioning as a notable unemployed guy
Tyler Walker (Temple OC) parlayed success at Montana State into a major college football OC job and we could try to poach him from the Owls before even coaching a game, though he has a very thin resume compared to others on this list
Danny Freund (Washington State OC) hitched a ride with his head coach at South Dakota State to move up a level and maybe we could try to poach him from the Cougs before even coaching a game, much more established resume than Walker
Josh Davis (Fresno State OC) parlayed success at South Dakota into a major college football OC job.....you know where I'm going with this
Jim Chapin (Central Michigan OC) parlayed success at North Dakota into a major college football OC job.....
Luke Schleusner (New Mexico OC) hitched a ride with his head coach at Idaho to move up a level, but the offensive trajectory at Idaho was poor so this one doesn't jump out
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The first ten names would be serious Power Four program kind of people to go after but there are others like Davis and Petrino I'd be intrigued by.
Of course not an exhaustive list, just some people whose resumes struck me as credible and whose current employment or lack thereof made me think we could make a play. I did this because it's driving me crazy that we don't have a head coach or offensive coordinator or QB coach, but this is somewhat cart before the horse with needing to know the plan for head coach. A head coach, whether interim or permanent, would have his own vision and network and potentially skillset to be the OC like Taylor was.
