Frank Spaziani fired: New Boston College AD has moves to make

The Boston College Eagles and their new athletic director will not ride with Frank Spaziani for another season, the school has announced. The four-year head coach and longtime BC man departs Chestnut Hill after entering the year with one of the nation’s warmest seats.

The Eagles have been more or less worse in every year since Spaziani took over for Jeff Jagodzinski, the bowl-winner with the 20-8 record and top-10 finish who was fired for interviewing for the New York Jets job. Since going 8-5 in his rookie year, Spaziani has fielded 7-6, 4-8 and 2-10 teams.

It could be argued Spaziani’s done no worse than let the team slide to pre-Tom O’Brien levels and that losing a player of program-defining caliber like Matt Ryan would hurt anybody’s chances of winning and that injuries have long been a problem for BC. These are the best cases to make for keeping Spaziani. That, and he’s been there in one capacity or another since 1997.

With Gene DeFilippo (the guy who fired Jagodzinski and promoted Spaziani) moving along in September, new athletic director Brad Bates had to hit reset on the plummeting football program (or be run right off the E-streets by angry BC fans), and he’s now reportedly done just that. All things considered, this would be perhaps the least surprising firing in the country -- Spaziani’s been dealing with questions about his status all season long.

As for where Bates goes from here, SB Nation Boston has a list of recommendations:

1) Dave Doeren. Currently the Head Coach at Northern Illinois, Doeren has been a rousing success in his short tenure. The Huskies won their first MAC Championship last season and are in position to do it again. Known as a good recruiter and, so far, good in-game coach (defense is his specialty), Doeren has major college experience with both Kansas and Wisconsin as a position coach and coordinator. He’s also relatively young at 40 years old and makes a shade under 400k coaching the Huskies.

2) Bob Diaco. The young defensive coordinator at Notre Dame is known as one of the best recruiters in the country and looking at the unbelievable amount of talent he’s helped acquire in South Bend, it’s hard to argue. Diaco is devoid of any head coaching experience at the college level, but fits the bill for BC in the sense that he’s accustomed to the high standards placed on recruits, knows the midwest recruiting territory (a BC staple) and helps lead one of the best defenses in America. Coaching acumen is obviously questionable because of the lack of experience, but the potential positives far outweigh the unknown.

3) Pete Carmichael, Jr. Probably the biggest longshot of the three candidates, Carmichael would be a dream hire for BC fans because of his local ties (born in Massachusetts, played at Boston College, previously coached in New England, etc.). He’d be the ideal candidate for rallying the fanbase and generating excitement. Carmichael is currently the offensive coordinator with the New Orleans Saints where, behind quarterback Drew Brees, the Saints have won a Super Bowl and have been one of the top offenses in the NFL for the last four or five years. The reason Carmichael would seemingly be a longshot would be because of his potential candidacy for head coaching jobs in the NFL this upcoming offseason. Also, with the Saints season nowhere near over, it would be at least a few weeks before BC would be able to talk to him and the school might not be willing to wait that long. Carmichael has yet to be a head coach at any level and has only minimal experience as a college coach.

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