The 14 steps along the path to a college football coach getting fired

Think back to the day your college football coach was hired. He was the right guy. He was excited to be there, and you were excited to have him. His intro press conference filled you with optimism.

But that was then. Your team’s falling on hard times again, and it’s time to make a change.

There is a rhythm to the head coach exit. The ebbs and flows that beget the pink slip are largely the same at each school. While there are always going to be unpredictable, overnight breakups, programs tend to progress through the same stages, and it usually plays out over a two-season stretch.

So, where is your program on the progression?

Maybe the coach has had some time to tear the program down to the studs and rebuild. Maybe he’s an institution, and things are just starting to stale. Either way, the fan base needs some proof this thing is going to work long-term.

This isn’t the loss that signals the end. This is just planting the seed. You shouldn’t lose to this team, but here we are.

Like when Texas lost, 24-0, to Iowa State in Charlie Strong’s second year.

All the good feelings, all the talk about the potential for bowl eligibility and progress? Out the window. This team won’t have a postseason and Strong has major questions to answer. Saying that the team is better than it showed will no longer suffice. If there’s one positive, it’s that he didn’t try to do so in the post-game press conference.

Strong would get one more season.

Everyone’s upset, and it’s time for the coach to take responsibility, like Will Muschamp after Florida lost to then-FCS Georgia Southern:

“You got to change the scoreboard offensively. You got to be able to change the scoreboard. We’ve just struggled scoring points offensively. It’s been a week-in, week-out occurrence. My job to get it fixed and it will get fixed.”

Oh, that did not get fixed. Muschamp would exit stage left the next season.

There’s blood in the water, but your AD or school president isn’t punting yet. They just need a little bit more time. Like Kyle Flood at Rutgers, when then-AD Julie Hermann pledged support.

Flood is 15-10 in his two seasons.

“Our football program continues to evolve and grow, as evidenced by the changes Coach Flood just announced,” Hermann said in a statement. “I support these moves and Kyle’s leadership as we transition into the Big Ten.

Flood would be gone after two more flailing seasons.

One side of the ball just isn’t working like it’s supposed to. It’s time to axe a coordinator to placate the masses. The new guy can promise the offense/defense will be more multiple and physical.

Finish 97th nationally in total defense like Maryland did in 2014? It’s time for a change.

The Terrapins’ defense had declined statistically over each of the past two seasons, culminating in disappointing performances for the senior-heavy unit against Rutgers and Stanford to end the season. Randy Edsall has decided to overhaul the defense[.]

Edsall would get the boot at the end of the 2015 season.

Is it a magic number, or is it the “right” wins on the schedule? Either way, if media days are dominated by trying to figure out the right combination of wins and losses, the goose is likely cooked.

How good is good enough for Michigan, and Brady Hoke, in 2014?

Not only in regaining the respect the Wolverines have lost since the shocking upset loss to Appalachian State to open the 2007 season, but to justify Hoke remaining as the Wolverines’ head football coach.

Hoke was gone by the end of 2014.

And the jig is close to up if one particular game is make-or-break.

There is a dwindling number of scenarios wherein [Al] Golden keeps his job, but all of them include Miami winning in Tallahassee (and then doing quite a few other things).

Golden couldn’t beat FSU, among other teams, and was out.

Your QB might be a veteran junior starter, but the offense just doesn’t look like it’s clicking. It’s high time for that backup to play and show the administration how great the future looks under you.

The bye week is a perfect time for this. He’s got the first week to get adjusted to the first-team offense, and the second week to get the game plan.

Helfrich became the first coach Oregon had fired since the 1970s.

Y’all see that grass over there? It’s green as hell.

You think it’s time for your AD to make a phone call to that former player coaching somewhere else, damnit. Certainly he’ll come home.

“I left Texas A&M because my school called me,” Bear Bryant said when he took the Alabama job 60 years ago. “Mama called, and when Mama calls, then you just have to come running.”

You might not have even fired your actual head coach yet, but it’s time for some public flirtation by the fan base (Lookin’ at you, Nebraska).

This one can take a ton of different forms. It could be calling for a Lane Kiffin tarmac firing this instant:

Perhaps the former players start weighing in:

Your area’s entire Twitter presence turns entirely to the cause:

And once that crosses over into the real world, you’re REALLY in trouble:

The effort here, just to get rid of guys who already seem like dead men walking, is truly stunning.

The highest-ranking rich guy has had enough. He’s called the folks he drinks with at suite level and started to pass the hat. Your coach has a buyout number to hit.

Beat writers are getting wind that the people who control the pocketbooks have had it up to here.

But when Ed Hansen — lawyer, multimillionaire, University of Washington alumnus and former three-term Everett mayor — wrote UW President Mark Emmert six weeks ago, he abandoned all sense of delicacy.

Hansen, unhappy with the state of Huskies football, placed a price upon the head of the football coach and the school’s athletic director. His e-mail said:

“By this letter I hereby pledge to contribute a minimum of $100,000 towards a law school scholarship within 90 days, conditioned upon the termination of Ty Willingham as football coach.

Willingham would be gone by the end of that season.

The message board chatter is at a fever pitch, and the season isn’t going well at all. But the head coach is trying to stay positive and wants you to be too, like Gene Chizik in 2011.

“They’re going to say what they’re going to say and discuss what they’re going to discuss, and you have absolutely no control over that. I call those energy vampires. They’re not going to suck my energy out worrying about that. That’s how we work.”

Chizik would last through 2011, but be gone after 2012.

As media members, we often want to give coaches a bit more benefit of doubt than fans. Particularly if the coach seems like a good guy. Mid-season firings sometimes seem impulsive, after all.

But when the local columnist does drop the guillotine, it’s another indicator that the situation is untenable.

Has Bob Diaco coached his final football game at UConn? He’s done little to earn himself another season. The Huskies lost to Tulane Saturday to finish 1-7 in the American, a game almost nobody attended, and went an entire month — 16 quarters over parts of five games — without a touchdown.

A month after that story got published, Diaco was shown the door.

It could be a blowout, or it could be a close shave, but there’s always one loss that signals that the end is truly nigh. An example? Losing to Kansas, if you’re Texas.

The Texas Longhorns, a titan of college football, just lost to Kansas in overtime, 24-21. This is the first time the Horns have lost to the Jayhawks since the Great Depression.

Strong would get canned the next week.

It’s probably a Sunday morning, and your coach is about to have a closed-door meeting with the AD. The loss last night was rough. It’ll all be over soon. Players start finding out on Twitter or via their news apps, just like the rest of us, and begin to voice their displeasure. The news is leaking, but they are yet to have their team meeting to make things official.

Recruits who are experiencing the business end of college football for the first time start chiming in.

The team meeting is announced.

And around the time the meeting goes down, the end comes.

The official statement brings an end to the often long (but sometimes short) march through the hot seat stages. It could be termed a “mutual parting of the ways,” could be a firing, or a forced resignation.

Certainly the next hire won’t end like this one did, right?