2024 Football Coaching Carousel

Blake Anderson out at Utah State, along with the school’s interim AD and a football team staffer, for Title IX violations regarding reports of sexual and domestic violence in the spring of 2023. Reading between the lines of the press release, it appears they attempted to investigate alleged sexual and domestic violence themselves and failed to report it as required.

Anderson’s previous greatest hits include telling USU players that it “has never been more glamorized to be a victim” of rape.

All of this after he just had another kid too

This is probably the best place to ask about Shane Montgomery. This quote is from the HustleBelt article on us and curious of your greater experience and perception of OC Shane Montgomery.

The UMass offense showed much potential with its ground-focused scheme last year. However, offensive coordinator Steve Casula left Amherst for Michigan to become their tight ends coach. In a move which will be familiar with long-time MAC fans, former Miami RedHawks head coach Shane Montgomery is set to take over coordinating responsibilities for the Minutemen.

UMass fans should be thrilled by this move. Montgomery has built a reputation as a quarterback whisperer in his long career. His most famous quarterback is Ben Roethlisberger, but his schemes also allowed Ben DiNucci of James Madison, Josh Betts of Miami and Kurt Hess of Youngstown State to have prolific college careers as well.

Montgomery’s success with DiNucci shows he can scheme for a mobile quarterback like Taisun Phomachanh. Furthermore, his attacks at James Madison and Buffalo have been incredibly balanced, preserving Don Brown’s affinity for the run. UMass fans could have their best offense since Andy Isabella’s Biletnikoff finalist year.

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As an OC for Miami, we can’t argue with his success. As a HC, eh…not so much…

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At Miami Shane was a solid family man and well liked by all/most. He earned the head coaching position whenTerry Hoeppner took the Indiana job. It seemed like our administration did not give him as big of an assistant pool budget as was needed and Shane ended up doing both the offensive Coordinator and head coaching role which was probably too much for a first time head coach. His offense with Big Ben in 2003 was probably our best ever.

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Thanks for the input and will be watching 9/28. Good luck, except that game.

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Hey, Steve! Welcome back to the MAC!

The offense Montgomery takes over this year will look a lot different from the one Miami faced last season in the two-day game in Amherst.

UMass has been one of the most active schools in the portal this off season - about 20 out and 20 in.

We didn’t face Phomachanh because of an injury last year. He will present a deferent challenge to Miami’s D in Oxford.

Additionally, Desrosiers, Carlos Davis, and Lynch-Adams transferred out, making the 2024 Minuteman offense a bit of a puzzle for teams trying to size them up two months before the season starts.

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Got to know Shane when he was at Miami, great person. I think given a different situation he could have been a good head coach. With his offense though look for lots of wide receiver screens and short passes to backs out of the back field, lots of dink and dunk.

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I don’t know if Shane ever would have been cut out for being a head coach, but I do know the opportunity he got here was absolutely the wrong one.

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The staff Shane assembled here in Oxford was remarkable for it’s inexperience. My recollection is that every coach but one was either moving from position coach to coordinator or was stepping up into the FBS from a lower division.

To what extent that was a product of budgetary constraints or Shane’s choices I do not know. Even before Shane’s first season there were posters on this board that were very concerned by the staff.

As a coordinator here he was excellent and I don’t have any reason to think he won’t be successful in Amherst as well.

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Budget was a HUGE driver. He chose to be his own OC so that he could save that money and pay the rest of the coaching staff a little more than the meager amount Miami gave them. It was really quite awful.

I have no idea how he’d have done with the budget we have now. Maybe he’s not a head coach. But he was taking two jobs to save like $80k so he could redistribute that money to the staff.

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I can also confirm this with first hand knowledge

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I would be curious to see how he did as head coach with over a decade of additional experience and contacts. Would probably be FCS with where his career is at and maybe he wouldn’t want that, but still curious.

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Getting back to the original topic, Jeff Tedford is out at Fresno State. Their LB coach will serve as the interim coach this season.

This is the second time health reasons have forced Tedford to retire. The first time, in 2019, he was replaced by Kalen DeBoer. He took over once again when DeBoer went to Washington. His doctors have told him he gets no more chances.

Too bad. He was a solid coach.

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