Miami football coaching candidates emerge from outside

Mark Richt’s retirement created the standard list of candidates to replace him. In the press conference discussing Richt’s retirement Athletic Director Blake James said they would have a National Search for his successor as the Miami Football Coach.

The National Search was the same thing that James and Richt stated when the Miami Football program lost former Defensive Coordinator Manny Diaz to the Temple Head Coaching job. About 24 hours after Diaz was introduced as Temple Head Coach Miami announced they were promoting from within for his replacement.

Outside Linebackers Coach Jonathan Patke and Safeties Coach Ephraim Banda were promoted to be the Co-Defensive Coordinators to replace Diaz. It was hard to trust what other changes would be made after that.

James issued a statement following Miami’s loss to Wisconsin in the Pinstripe Bowl that he and Richt would work together to get the Miami Football Program back to National Prominence. Three days later Richt retired.

When Richt announced his retirement names to replace him included former Miami and current FIU Head Coach Butch Davis, FAU Head Coach Lane Kiffin, Diaz, Oregon Head Coach and Miami alum Mario Cristobal and former Florida and Ohio State Head Coach Urban Meyer. They all have roadblocks from making them, candidates.

The options that James’ has to replace Richt go far beyond the ones above. Miami is still an elite program even if they haven’t been on the field for most of the last 15 years. Some of the bigger media sites nationally have already come out with lists of coaches to replace Richt. The ones that have not will do so in the next few days.

Some of the names have connections to the Miami Football program and some came out of the blue. The Miami Herald’s Barry Jackson broke the news of one huge name and CBS Sports and Sports Illustrated also came up with their own lists.