Updated Wording: Brian Kelly

Jeremy · 11-24-2006, 12:07 PM

Brian Kelly – A Coach First, Salesman Second
CycloneFanatic.com
Jeremy Lind

SPECULATION BASED ON RUMORS & SOURCES

If one thing is certain it’s that Jamie Pollard sure knows how to perform a top-notch coaching search. While we had him pegged correctly on the Men’s Basketball search until McDermott gave the AD a call the night before he was to offer Jeter the position, nobody has been accurate this time around, not even those closest to the situation. Will the new FB Head Coach find out from CycloneFanatic.com that he got the job like McDermott has hinted he did? We can only hope:)

With the College Football regular season ending soon for most teams, most of the vacancies in major programs will be filled shortly. Iowa State is just days away from being one of the early programs to get a new Head Coach named before the Bowl Season begins. Who has been pegged to take over after 12 years under Dan McCarney, read on for the latest news…

According to sources, Brian Kelly, Head Coach at Central Michigan, has been in negotiations with Iowa State over the past week. While Kelly has gone pretty much under the radar compared to some of the higher-profile names, he has been debated a lot as a candidate with a strong resume of rebuilding programs and overachieving.

From what sources have said, and if they are correct, I would expect an announcement sometime next week introducing Kelly as the next Head Coach. Kelly will apparently coach the Chippewas today and in the MAC Championship game on the 30th before stepping aside for an interim coach to take over the Bowl-Game duties on the sidelines. While sources could be wrong, I personally feel comfortable with the information but I understand that we can only know what they tell us and sometimes thats what the people with power want them to tell us.

I’m told that ISU entered the search having deciding on a maximum of $1.75million/year for the perfect coach if it came to bidding. From all indications, the new contract will be for far less but it will be competitive enough to keep Kelly around for a while and to ensure he can feel comfortable that he’ll be provided enough time to get things going for the Cyclones. Other schools that showed a lot of interest in Kelly over the past few weeks include Michigan State and Miami, to a certain degree. Some sources are saying that Kelly is a finalist for the MSU job so it will be interesting to see how things progress.

Kelly, a native of Chelsea, Mass., has been the Head Coach at Central Michigan for the past three years and coached at Grand Valley State (Div II) for thirteen years that included two DII National Championships. Kelly entered the season with a career record of 128-47-2.

With an impressive resume and apparently great talent for building relationships with players, one would assume Kelly would fit in great in Ames, IA. While he’s not extremely vocal or flashy, he gets the job done time and time again with what a lot have considered to be lesser talent and opportunities.

Having coached his team against the likes of Michigan, Kelly should have no problem adjusting to the Big XII Conference and the teams he’ll face every week. Kelly might not be the PR salesman that DMac was but he has a great resume, a big-time desire to succeed and he understands what it takes to be successful with the cards stacked against him.

[table=head]Year|School|W-L Overall|W-L Conference
1991|Grand Valley State|9-3|8-2 *
1992|Grand Valley State|8-3|8-2 @
1993|Grand Valley State|6-3-2|6-2-2
1994|Grand Valley State|8-4|8-2 *
1995|Grand Valley State|8-3|8-2
1996|Grand Valley State|8-3|8-2
1997|Grand Valley State|9-2|9-1 #
1998|Grand Valley State|9-3|9-1 #*
1999|Grand Valley State|5-5|5-4
2000|Grand Valley State|7-4|7-3
2001|Grand Valley State|13-1|9-0 #**
2002|Grand Valley State|14-0|9-0 #***
2003|Grand Valley State|14-1|9-1 ***
2004|Central Michigan|4-7|3-5
2005|Central Michigan|6-5|5-3
|Totals|128-47-2|111-30-2[/table]

* NCAA Division II Playoffs
** NCAA Division II Finalist
*** NCAA Division II Champion
@ shared GLIAC Championship

Disclaimer: This article is based on speculation from sources and should not be taken as fact until otherwise stated as such.

kurimski · 11-24-2006, 12:17 PM

Kelley is going to have to be a some what good salesman to succeed in Ames. It's great to see that he has a good track record but if he's going to go where most of the alumni and fans want to go he's going to need to recruit good talent and that can be difficult to do. What kind of offensive style and defense does he like to play? Anybody know?

travman23 · 11-24-2006, 12:18 PM

Jeremy, good info but didn't you basically say the same kind of things about Harbaugh being a lock just the other week? I'm not trying to knock on your or your sources but I'm not going to believe anything as fact until major outlets start reporting a hire is coming because we've been down this road before with Harbaugh and Norvell to some extent too.

guitarchitect7 · 11-24-2006, 12:20 PM

Great article. i know all of us appreciate it, even if everything isnt set in stone as of yet. I look forward to hearing more insight from you and others on this possible hire.

I do find it interesting that in 1999 he went 5-4 after very successful seasons in the past, but was able to pull it out and go to the championship. I hope that this doesn't become another McCareny trend, and people give up on him too quickly.

ripvdub · 11-24-2006, 12:21 PM

We better not pay Kelly 1.75 mil. or anything more than what Mac was making. Especially if theyre paying McDerm only 650,000. Did mac get an increase this last year to 1.5 so his pay was in the middle of the Big XII?

ISUFan22 · 11-24-2006, 12:21 PM

Looks like it's Kelly - and I thought that before this was posted.

tec71 · 11-24-2006, 12:21 PM

No steps backward are allowed in my book. Want my money or the people I work for (who actually have significant amounts to give) we think he needs to win now, and win a lot. If Mac would have come back under a win (8-3,9-2) or else type of situation then that's good enough for me with this guy too. Win or stop putting your hand out for more money, and go back to cheesehead land.

Jeremy · 11-24-2006, 12:22 PM

Originally Posted by travman23

Jeremy, good info but didn't you basically say the same kind of things about Harbaugh being a lock just the other week? I'm not trying to knock on your or your sources but I'm not going to believe anything as fact until major outlets start reporting a hire is coming because we've been down this road before with Harbaugh and Norvell to some extent too.

Nothing is done until JP himself announces it. Jeter was a done deal all but contractually until an 11th hour call from Mac. I don't see the same situation happening here. The reason Harbaugh was believed to be the man up until a week ago was that he himself felt he had the job. Norvell was hyped by other places as being a sure get but I never felt that he would get the job because of his connections to Mac.

I'm not saying that Kelly will unconditionally be the man, I'm only saying what my sources told me. They could be wrong or not, JP will tell us.

ekim121 · 11-24-2006, 12:25 PM

The MAC is quite the springboard....I hope he's an Urban Meyer (minus the leaving for a huge program) and not a Gary Pinkel.

JHutch · 11-24-2006, 12:25 PM

i think kelly and ISU will be a good combo

Nothingman · 11-24-2006, 12:28 PM

After all of the names we've heard over the last two weeks I'm not especially excited in Kelly but if he gets the job I'll be behind him and the team 100%.

Angie · 11-24-2006, 12:41 PM

To all of the people w/posts bashing CF - they will be deleted. Jeremy is posting information as it comes. I know that other Cyclone sites have had the same changing information that Jeremy has, because hiring a coach is a volatile, fluid process that changes from day to day.

We encourage free speech here, so feel free to discuss whatever you'd like - as long as it's not disrespectful to anyone else on the site, including the owner.

ISUFan22 · 11-24-2006, 12:44 PM

Originally Posted by Angie

To all of the people w/posts bashing CF - they will be deleted. Jeremy is posting information as it comes. I know that other Cyclone sites have had the same changing information that Jeremy has, because hiring a coach is a volatile, fluid process that changes from day to day.

We encourage free speech here, so feel free to discuss whatever you'd like - as long as it's not disrespectful to anyone else on the site, including the owner.

Exactly.

In addition, please stay away from throwing mud on the other sites as well. We're not fans of bashing anyone in the Cyclone family.