Coleman Scott, a 2012 Olympic bronze medalist in freestyle, was named head wrestling coach at UNC after one year on staff in Chapel Hill (Photo/John Sachs, Tech-Fall.com)This year? By our count, there has been one new head coach named at a D1 program in the offseason ... and that was just last week, when Coleman Scott officially took the helm at the University of North Carolina, having been named interim head coach upon the firing of C.D. Mock in mid-June. This late in the game, we're not expecting any additional announcements; most schools have their coaching staffs in place. (Just to be clear, we're not including the announcement earlier this summer from Michigan State, revealing that long-time head coach Tom Minkel would be retiring at the end of the 2015-16 season, with Spartan assistant coach Roger Chandler named to take the reins.)
Let's take a quick look back at the summer of '14. From Long Island to the Grand Canyon State, a dozen Division I schools sported new head coaches by the end of August. In alphabetical order ... the Air Force Academy landed Sam Barber. Kevin Ward took command at Army. Arizona State welcomed Zeke Jones. Cary Kolat came to Campbell University. Eastern Michigan elevated assistant coach David Bolyard. Grand Canyon University, a fairly new member of the D1 ranks, fired R.C. LaHaye, and hired Jon Sioredas. Hofstra hired Dennis Papadatos. Navy welcomed long-time Air Force coach Joel Sharratt onboard. Troy Nickerson became head coach at Northern Colorado. Penn picked Alex Tirapelle. Tony Ersland now heads up the Purdue Boilermakers. And, after a decade-and-a-half of serving as assistant coach at various programs, Sammie Henson is now the head coach at West Virginia.
The coaching changes in 2014 weren't limited to a dozen head honchos. Last Labor Day, I tallied approximately 90 coaching hires, ranging from the naming of new volunteer assistants, to the hiring of new head coaches ... a number far exceeding the typical number of new coaching staff changes in a typical year. (And it's possible that I missed a few along the way.) In fact, since I had first started charting the coaching changes (the summer of 2009), a typical off-season might have two dozen changes at any level. So 2014 appears to have been not only extremely busy, but also an aberration.
Why the difference between 2014 and 2015?
For starters, it's not every day that all three of the Division I service academies now have a new head wrestling coach. And, it's not as if there have been no coaching changes during this off-season. However, most hiring announcements this summer have involved head coaches at schools other than D1, such as NCAA Division III ... or the naming of assistant coaches at all levels.
So ... what happened in 2014?
Last year, in recapping the myriad Division I head coaching changes, I used the image of the kids' game of musical chairs. As one head coaching chair opens up, others vie for it -- whether they're assistant coaches seeking a move up, or head coaches who think the new assignment would be more attractive. In 2014, the "game" seemed to go into overdrive -- more contestants, with more open positions becoming available faster, then being filled at incredible speed.
While the number of coaching changes seems to be in flux from year to year, it appears there may be an emerging trend -- a big-picture change -- in the coaching carousel. In the past, there seemed to be a fairly standard model: a wrestler landed a graduate assistant position at a school, then got hired on as a paid assistant, then, eventually, was elevated to the head coaching position at that school (or another) until, after two decades or more, he retired. More recently, a number of fairly young head coaches in their thirties or early forties seemed to reach a point where they have said, "Enough!" and announced they were going into the world of business ... or becoming high school coaches. More than one official announcement of a coach's voluntary leaving used phraseology such as "I want to spend more time with my family." In other words, seeking a better work-life balance while their kids were still at home.
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