Ask Farrell: Did Morris, Taggart have enough time to turn things around?
There was a massive amount of coaching changes heading into the 2018 season, one of the busier coaching carousels in recent memory - and already two of those hires have been fired by their schools.
Florida State fired Willie Taggart after the Seminoles lost to Miami, 27-10, on Nov. 2 as Taggart fell to 9-12 (6-9 in the ACC) not even through his second season. In the team's first game without Taggart, and with Odell Haggins as interim coach, it defeated Boston College, 38-31, on Saturday.
There have been numerous rumors and chatter about who could become Florida State’s next coach as it’s one of the elite positions in all of college football. Bob Stoops has been mentioned. Even Deion Sanders has - seemingly erroneously - been among the candidates.
On Sunday, it was announced that Arkansas has cut ties with coach Chad Morris after just 22 games. The Razorbacks got blown out by Western Kentucky on Saturday, an embarrassing 45-19 defeat.
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Morris was 4-18 and winless in 14 tries in SEC games as he was transitioning Arkansas from a power-run attack to a spread offense with little success in his second season.
Early names floated for the Arkansas job include Iowa State’s Matt Campbell, Memphis’ Mike Norvell, Wake Forest’s Dave Clawson and FAU’s Lane Kiffin.
Neither Taggart or Morris had much success at their respective schools but both were recruiting very well and putting together impressive recruiting classes.
In the 2019 class, the Razorbacks had the No. 20 class overall with 13 four-stars included, some who are already contributing to the program. Florida State has a top-20 class in 2020 and finished No. 18 in 2019.
We ask Rivals National Recruiting Director Mike Farrell if Taggart and Morris were realistically given enough time to turn their programs around or if coaches need a little more than one-and-a-half seasons to truly implement meaningful change?
FARRELL'S TAKE
“It’s a new day and age in college football and coaches better get used to it. If your program isn’t moving forward in year two and is clearly moving backwards then you’re on the hot seat and that’s what happened with Taggart and Morris. Morris was an obvious choice for the chopping block because his team was a disaster at Arkansas and it was clear they weren’t going to be competitive or win an SEC game anytime soon. Taggart surprises me a bit more because of the huge buyout but the right decision was made as FSU looked far from the team we expect to see on the field. I’m usually for coaches getting three years at the least to show progress but when it’s clear that things aren’t going to work out then there’s no need to wait. The next coaches can do no worse.”