Scattershooting: ACC Coaching Changes Will Lead To Busy Offseason
Posted on Friday, Dec. 7, 2018, 3:59 pm
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By Jerry Ratcliffe
Scattershooting around the ACC, while noting the coaching changes that will have Virginia’s Bronco Mendenhall and his staff watching tons of old game tape to get a handle on what these new additions are all about …
Three UVa opponents, two in the Coastal Division and one in the Atlantic, have all hired new coaches, which means that the Cavaliers staff will be conducting lots of research on the new head coaches and their styles, in addition to the tendencies and quirks of those three head coaches’ offensive and defensive coordinators.
Georgia Tech filled the last ACC head coaching job within the last 12 hours by hiring Temple head coach Geoff Collins. Earlier, Louisville hired Appalachian State’s Scott Satterfield, and Carolina hired veteran Mack Brown.
If that isn’t enough, consider that two of Virginia’s nonconference opponents, William & Mary and Liberty, also have new head coaches. Also consider that the Cavaliers will face Florida State next season, a program that UVa hasn’t faced since 2014, and Notre Dame (2015), which the Wahoos haven’t played since Bronco Mendenhall came aboard, and that’s a lot of catching up to do.
UVa opens up next season with William & Mary and new head coach Mike London, the former Cavaliers’ head coach prior to Mendenhall’s hiring, then faces ODU for the first time ever (which also means more studying), then at Notre Dame, then Liberty, which hired former Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze on Friday. No, that’s not a typo.
Freeze was considered as a candidate for Florida State’s offensive coordinator’s job until Liberty hired him as head coach today. FSU, by the way, is now talking to just fired North Carolina head coach Larry Fedora for the offensive coordinator’s job in Tallahassee.
Meanwhile in Lynchburg, Freeze and Liberty AD Ian McGraw, are both getting ripped for that hiring.
McGraw was the AD at Baylor during the sexual assault scandal involving several players. Freeze was fired at Ole Miss following numerous NCAA violations, but was triggered his exit was the unveiling of a pattern of phone calls Freeze made to an escort service during recruiting trips.
As you can imagine, the reaction to the Liberty hiring is not going well.
For Mendenhall, that’s a whole lot of new faces, new philosophies to become familiar with.
Georgia Tech fans will likely feel a little strange not watching option football for the first time in more than a decade.
Collins, who had an overall 15-10 record in two years as head coach at Temple, runs a more standard, modern offense. Get this Yellow Jackets fans: Collins’ offense with the Owls is ranked 39th nationally in the forward pass, something you’re not accustomed to seeing much.
The problem that Collins will have is trying to transition players recruited for an option offense into a different style of play. That may take awhile, and because Tech’s current recruiting commitment list (16 players) is ranked No. 51 nationally by 247 Sports, it doesn’t appear there’s a lot of overwhelming talent coming to the program.
Early signing period is Dec. 19, so Collins is already behind the proverbial 8-ball.
Tech also interviewed LA Chargers offensive coordinator Ken Whisenhunt, but that news was not well received amongst the Jacket alums.
Meanwhile in Louisville, Cardinals fans are somewhat pumped up about the hiring of Satterfield, a 45-year-old coach who was 51-24 in six seasons at Appy, and won at least a share of three Sunbelt Conference titles.
Many Tar Heels fans were hoping that Carolina would hire Satterfield and his entire Appalachian State staff.
Satterfield runs a spread-option offense.
He will get a nice bump in pay from $712,000 annually to $3.25 million.
The move makes sense for Satterfield, who had done about all he could do at Appy, and wanted to be challenged at a higher level. He said that he might go the graduate transfer ranks to find a quarterback, and you can’t blame him because neither Juwon Pass or Malik Cunningham were very impressive this past season, and both return.
Down in Chapel Hill, the Mack Brown Experiment is being met with mixed reviews. Some Tar Heels alums are excited. They believe Brown’s ability to recruit the state will turn the program around. Others believe that Brown has been out of the game too long (five years), or out of the state (20 years) too long and doesn’t have the name recognition that will resonate with state high school coaches or recruits.
Brown is a big-time recruiter, or shall we say, closer. He puts a premium on his assistants hitting the recruiting trail hard, particular in the state.
One of the key swas hiring Tim Brewster, a very impressive recruiter, who worked for Brown at UNC and at Texas where Brown won a national championship. Another key will be who Brown hires as his offensive and defensive coordinators (Gene Chizik is rumored).
Quick Hitters …
# Former Clemson QB Kelly Bryant, who was 16-2 as a starter, will sign with Missouri. He also considered UNC, Miami, Auburn and others. At Mizzou, he will work with offensive coordinator Derek Dooley, a former Wahoo wide receiver and son of legendary Georgia coach Vince Dooley.
# In case you didn’t count ‘em up, 11 ACC teams will be playing in bowl games.
# Virginia’s defense will catch a break in the Belk Bowl (Dec. 29 in Charlotte) because South Carolina’s top receiver, Deebo Samuel, has decided to skip the game.
Deebo told Richmond Weaver of Rich Take on Sports: “I think I made the decision because the past three or four years I’ve been dealing with injuries. This is my first year being injury free. I just took advantage of that. I talked to my mom and dad about it. I actually talked to Will Muschamp about it before I made the decision and he also said, ‘I think you’re making the right decision.’”
# Tony Bennett said he has his rotation nearly set as we move closer to the ACC portion of the schedule. After the win over Morgan State the other night, Tony said, “we’re going to need them all at different times. The game will dictate who is playing, how a guy has practiced. There’s not a lot of separation with a number of guys.
“We have established our seven guys, and then eight and nine are still up for grabs, and obviously Cody is 10.”
The first seven: Kyle Guy, Ty Jerome, Jack Salt, De’Andre Hunter, Kihei Clark, Braxton Key, and Mamadi Diakite. No. 8-9: Marco Anthony and Jay Huff. No. 10: Cody Stattmann.
Meanwhile, redshirt freshman forward Frankie Badocchi (Milan, Italy) was on UVa’s bench for the Morgan State game.
“He suited up (for the first time this season) and practiced for a few days,” Bennett said. “It’s great to have him back and part of it, we just wanted him to suit up. He’s back with us and we’re excited that he’s with us.”
There had been rumors that Badocchi would not be returning to the team due to health reasons.
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