How Mel Tucker's Contract Changed College Football Landscape

 

Tuesday, July 26, 2022 - Dennis Dodd joins Tommy Tran to discuss how Mel Tucker's contract changed the college football landscape.

VIDEO

Mel Tucker heads to Alabama as part of Big Ten educational trip on Selma and Montgomery

 

Published: Jul. 13, 2022, 4:11 p.m.

Head Coach Mel Tucker returns an autographed football to a fan during Michigan State University’s spring football practice at Spartan Stadium on Saturday, April 16, 2022 (Jenifer Veloso | MLive.com)Jenifer Veloso

By Matt Wenzel | mwenzel2@mlive.com

Michigan State football will be well represented on an educational trip to Alabama about the civil rights movement.

Coach Mel Tucker, wide receiver Tre Mosley, offensive tackle Spencer Brown and tight end Maliq Carr are part of a group from the university taking part this weekend in the Big Life Series: Selma to Montgomery, it was announced Wednesday. Michigan State chief diversity, equity and inclusion officer Dr. Ashley Baker and women’s track and field standout Brooke Bogan will also represent the university on the trip.

The Big Life Series: Selma to Montgomery, was announced by the Big Ten during Black History Month this year as an action of the conference’s equality coalition. The conference will send a group of 100 athletes, coaches, administrators and staff on a trip that will also include representatives from the Pac-12 and ACC.

“We established the Big Life Series to help further prepare our student-athletes to impact the world beyond their athletic careers,” Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren said in a press release. “Our trip to Selma and Montgomery is a first in a series of trips that our student-athletes, administrators, and members of the Big Ten Equality Coalition will take to inspire a meaningful dialogue about racial, social, religious, and cultural injustices in our nation. Big Life Series: Selma to Montgomery will empower our Big Ten Conference family to use their voices to drive change in their respective communities.”

The Selma to Montgomery marches, led by Dr. Martin Luther King in the 1965, were organized to fight for voting rights and the 54-mile route in 1996 was established as the Selma to Montgomery National Historic Trail. Nonviolent marchers were stopped and beaten by law enforcement while crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge on March 7, 1965, in what became known at Bloody Sunday.

“This is an incredible opportunity to provide our Spartan student-athletes with an in-person learning experience in one of the most iconic historical sites of the Civil Rights Movement,” Baker said in a press release. “My hope is that we are able to embrace the learning, reflect on the experience, and return to our campus inspired to continue the push for change in our local community and beyond.”

The trip starts Friday night in Montgomery with viewing of the documentary series “Eyes on the Prize,” and a keynote speech from Sheyann Webb-Christburg, author and eyewitness of Bloody Sunday. On Saturday, the group will head to the First Baptist Church in Selma where students began the march to Montgomery.

Participants will march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge before returning to Montgomery to tour a variety of locations, including the Civil Rights Memorial Center, the Alabama Department of Archives and History, the Equal Justice Initiative Legacy Museum: From enslavement to mass incarceration, and the Interpretive Center at Alabama State University. Those on the trip will spend Saturday night listening to EJI Legacy Museum founder and social justice lawyer Bryan Stevenson before breaking off into groups to discuss their experiences. Those smaller sessions will be led by university diversity, equity and inclusion directors.

“I am so happy to be given the opportunity to go to Selma,” Bogan said in a press release. “I believe that going to see things such as the Edmund Pettus Bridge will really shine light on a new perspective for me. It’s one thing to learn about events and another to really be in the environment where said events actually happened. I’m excited for the knowledge and further understanding I’ll gain from this trip.”

Michigan State football wins without best player, another statement for Mel Tucker's program

 

Rainer Sabin, Detroit Free Press

Thu, December 30, 2021, 11:15 PM·4 min read

 

Free Press writer Rainer Sabin answers three questions after Michigan State football defeated Pitt, 31-21, at the Peach Bowl in Atlanta:

What was life after Kenneth Walker III like for MSU’s offense?

It’s impossible to overstate the impact Kenneth Walker III made on MSU in his lone season in East Lansing. The Wake Forest transfer invigorated a dormant rushing attack that ranked among the worst in program history during coach Mel Tucker’s inaugural year. He opted out of Thursday's Peach Bowl to set his sights on an NFL career. In 12 games, Walker left his fingerprints all over the Spartans’ offense.

He ran for 1,636 yards, the second-highest total in the country. He also scored 18 times as he sprinted into the school’s record books and onto the national stage. Walker’s amazing ascent (1,636 rushing yards, 18 touchdowns) culminated with the Doak Walker Award given to the nation’s best running back and the Walter Camp Player of the Year. His vision allowed him to find holes when there didn’t appear to be any. His power helped him shed tackles. This isn’t a talent that could be replaced.

Walker’s replacements — Jordan Simmons, Harold Joiner and Elijah Collins — struggled to gain traction. Together, they accounted for 46 rushing yards on 24 carries, which averaged out to 1.91 yards per attempt.

Their struggles became more evident when Michigan State bogged down in the red zone, an area of the field where the Spartans thrived with Walker. Entering Saturday, the Spartans had the highest touchdown conversion rate (66.7%) in the Big Ten once they ventured inside the 20-yard line. But they only punched it across the goal line once in three red-zone trips

That placed an increased burden on Payton Thorne, who delivered in crunch time and accounted for a career-high 354 passing yards and MSU's three offensive touchdowns.

Did a Pitt QB's injury validate the opt-out decisions?

In this new age of college football, perhaps no topic sparks more fervor than the recent trend of players skipping bowl games to preserve their health for a shot at the NFL. The old guard argues these draft hopefuls should cross the finish line with their teams instead of bailing on them with one more opportunity to play. The non-traditionalists contend the College Football Playoff has turned bowls into exhibitions and players shouldn’t risk their pro prospects by exposing themselves to potential injuries.

The debate raged in advance of the Peach Bowl, where Walker and Pitt quarterback Kenny Pickett elected to sit out the game. The two headliners were conspicuous by their absence and the sizzle surrounding the matchup disappeared. But their decisions were validated when Pickett’s replacement, Nick Patti, was knocked out with a left-arm injury after crashing into out of bounds during a 16-yard touchdown run in the first quarter. Patti was later spotted in a sling as Pickett, a Heisman Trophy finalist, watched from above. Could that have happened to him?

The question may have crossed his mind and Walker’s, too. Certainly, others were thinking those thoughts as the debate about opt outs continued.

What does this win mean for Michigan State?

The progress MSU made in Tucker’s second season has been nothing short of remarkable. A year after crashing to a 2-5 record that triggered a roster overhaul, the Spartans achieved double-digit victories, qualified for New Year’s Six bowl and handed rival Michigan its only loss. The future seems bright in East Lansing, and the promise Tucker showed prompted a pair of MSU boosters to lock him down with a $95 million contract extension.

Tucker began to offer some major dividends Thursday when he led the Spartans to an improbable comeback victory.

An offense without Walker managed to find a pathway to end zone as Thorne spearheaded a pair of fourth-quarter touchdown drives. A relentless pass rush stymied Pittsburgh's passing attack, which was blunted after Patti was sidelined.

Is this win a bellwether for what's in store in 2022? It's too early to tell. But a loss would have stung a program that flirted with a third defeat in its last five games. Instead, the resilient Spartans found a way.

By doing so, they changed the mood of their fanbase heading into the offseason. Sure there will be skeptics who wonder about a rushing attack that was toothless without Walker. And there will be doubters wondering about MSU's suspect pass defense rarely tested by Pitt's third-string quarterback. But by and large, the majority of MSU's supporters will relish a fantastic 11-2 season that no one could have predicted. They'll recognize this program overachieved and has positioned itself for a better tomorrow.

Opinion: Michigan State’s win with Mel Tucker is a glaring loss for the NFL

 

Rising star did serious “soul searching” while passed over repeatedly for NFL head coaching jobs

 

Jarrett Bell

USA TODAY

December 28, 2021

 

ATLANTA – Mel Tucker is here now. For a long time. This is the destination job, as Tucker declared it when he arrived at Michigan State in February 2020. If Tom Izzo can put Sparty on the map as a basketball hotbed (post-Magic), then Tucker can surely envision a football powerhouse,

And lo and behold, it took less than one full season for the big donors and power brokers to demonstrate faith with a 10-year, fully-guaranteed, $95 million contract extension that sends a message that they won’t let Tucker get away like his mentor, Nick Saban, did years ago in bolting from East Lansing to LSU.

But this wasn’t always the destination job. Tucker spent 10 years in the NFL, when he became the youngest defensive coordinator in Cleveland Browns history, had a stint as an interim coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars and for a spell was on the circuit as a candidate for an NFL head coaching gig.

Tucker, 49, may have received the largest contract extension in college football history at the time in less than one full season at Michigan State, but no NFL team ever saw fit to put him in charge. His NFL experience was so familiar to the legion of Black coaches who put in time, paid dues, prepared for the ultimate promotion, then saw themselves passed over for white candidates with lesser resumes.

With another NFL hiring cycle looming – against the backdrop of just four Black coaches hired for the 27 openings over the previous four cycles – Tucker’s case resonates for what it might have become on the pro level.

“I actually had to do some soul-searching when I was in the NFL,” Tucker told USA TODAY Sports during an exclusive interview as the Spartans (10-2) prepared for a Peach Bowl matchup against Pitt (11-2) on Thursday night. “I said, ‘Listen, you have to be OK with yourself as a person if you never become a head coach.’ I told myself that. Because I’m sitting there looking at guys that I coached with or that I knew that were head coaches. It was, ‘I can do that.’

“I was ready to be a head coach many, many years ago. When I interviewed for the Browns job in 2008, I firmly believed I could be an NFL head coach. Then they hired Eric Mangini.”

Mangini lasted two years and produced a 10-22 record. Tucker was reminded that in 2012 he lost out to Mike Mularkey for the Jaguars job. Mularkey was 2-14 in his one season.

“People always go, ‘Well, we want someone with experience.’ How the hell do you get that?" Tucker said. "It takes one person to say 'Yes, we’re going to take a chance on this guy.’ But I can remember sitting there saying, ‘No matter how good of a coach I am, I may never get that opportunity.’ “

Tucker’s soul-searching and the specter of racial barriers is hardly new. I’ve heard so many Black coaches express similar sentiments for decades, while hiring patterns often reflect the frustration that many experience. Tucker ultimately went back to the college level, the option that Herm Edwards (Arizona State) took in 2018 and Hue Jackson (Grambling) followed this year after not getting another NFL crack.

Tucker knows. It’s difficult for any coach from any hue to land a head coaching job in the NFL or at a major college. But he can surely relate to respected, passed-over Black coaches such as Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy and Bills defensive coordinator Leslie Frazier. He wonders, too, how Steelers defensive backs coach Teryl Austin (who previously coordinated a top-five defense) can just fall off the radar after once being viewed as a hot head coaching candidate.

“I’ve studied everything,” Tucker said, alluding to hiring patterns. “I asked a lot of questions. I watched how guys got jobs and I would trace it back. ‘How’d this guy get his job?’ You’d see, ‘He knew this guy,’ or ‘He was a grad assistant there,’ or ‘He knew the AD.’ I watched how all that happened and I realized I can’t hire myself. Becoming a head coach, especially as a Black coach, is like catching lightning in a bottle.”

Tucker, who grew up in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, has coaching in his DNA. His father, Mel Sr., who is enshrined in the Sports Hall of Fame at the University of Toledo, was his first coach – in Little League, basketball, at home and then some – and instilled “old-school” principles. Yet it wasn’t until Tucker realized that he wouldn’t make it as a pro football player following his college career as a defensive back at Wisconsin, that he had enough of a bug to pursue a coaching career.

The first stop was, ironically, Michigan State, where Saban hired him in 1997 as a grad assistant. Tucker also worked on Saban’s staffs at LSU and Alabama, and along the way took his advice to seek NFL experience on his resume (as Saban himself did before winning six national championships).

Tucker, though, said he never thought he’d coach in the NFL for 10 years, seeing himself as better suited to mold young men, on and off the field. He stayed in the NFL longer than originally projected, he admits, thinking he was close to landing a head coaching job. Saban, nonetheless, was spot-on about the value of NFL experience.

“There’s a lot of (expletive) that happens in the NFL,” said Tucker, who had stints with the Browns, Jaguars and Bears. “It’s rough. Especially if you’re not in winning franchises. It’s cutthroat. It’s rugged. And it’s long.”

Tucker, who won national championship rings as an assistant at Ohio State and Alabama, landed his first head coaching job at Colorado in 2019. He stayed in Boulder for just one season (5-7) before jumping to Michigan State. It just so happened that his charge to establish a new culture was greeted by the pandemic and a social justice movement sparked by the death of George Floyd.

What did Tucker learn about himself amid that challenge?

“It reinforced what I already knew: I was prepared for the job,” he said. “As a coach, stuff is always happening. You have to lead. And you cannot lead unless people know where you stand. ‘Here’s how I feel about George Floyd. Here’s how I feel about civic engagement. Here’s how I feel about COVID. Here’s how I feel about the way football should be played. Here’s how I feel about the health and safety of the players and coaching staff.’"

Tucker and his new program have rolled with the punches well enough to land in a New Year’s Six bowl game and, of course, for him to land the security of a long, massive contract. In 2022, only new LSU coach Brian Kelly will top the contract for Tucker in terms of total value at a public school. Tucker insists the deal won’t change his mindset. Of course, he still wants to win national championships … especially since he won’t be chasing Super Bowl glory.

“I had a good contract before the extension,” Tucker said. “So, it doesn’t change anything. But what it has done is raise the bar. And I think Michigan State is seen maybe in a different light now as we aspire to be a Tier 1 program.”

Achieve that and Tucker would certainly prove that Michigan State’s win is the NFL’s loss.

Mel Tucker Named Big Ten Coach of the Year

 

Report: NFL teams reached out to Mel Tucker before signing massive deal at Michigan State

 

Tyler Fangman | 2 days ago

 

The coaching carousel has been wild in college football this season. Many athletic directors rushed to give their successful coaches big-time contract extensions to keep their coaches from moving on to greener pastures.

 

That was a big theme in the B1G as both Penn State head coach James Franklin and head coach Mel Tucker got 10-year contracts that were 75 million and 95 million guaranteed respectively.

 

There were rumors that Michigan State’s Mel Tucker might be thinking about taking the LSU job that had opened this fall.

No one knew that Tucker was getting looks from the next level in the NFL until now.

“Before Mel Tucker and his agent Neil Cornrich negotiated a 10-year, fully-guaranteed $95 million extension with MSU that included more guaranteed money than any other college HC, NFL teams inquired to see if Tucker would have any interest in moving to the next level,” per source, according to ESPN’s Adam Schefter.

 

Michigan State has a hell of a football coach and is lucky they are keeping Tucker for the foreseeable future.

 

Michigan State ended the season 10-2 and 7-2 in the B1G, and the Spartans await their bowl game destination.

 

Adam Schefter: Mel Tucker’s $95 million guarantee surpasses all college Head Coaches

 

Michigan State coach Mel Tucker agrees to 10-year, $95 million contract as Spartans eye 10 wins

November 24, 2021

Michigan State football coach Mel Tucker on Wednesday agreed to a 10-year deal worth $95 million to remain with the Spartans, the school announced.

The new contract, which made headlines around college football last week leading up to the Spartans' game at Ohio State, makes Tucker one of the highest-paid coaches in the sport and comes four days before Michigan State closes its regular season.

Tucker can thank a group of Spartans donors -- Mat Ishbia, Steve St. Andre, Brian Mosallam and Jason Strayhorn -- who gathered to help complete the deal this month, as Michigan State takes a turn toward recruiting.

"Every day I wake up feeling humbled to be the Head Football Coach at Michigan State," Tucker wrote in a letter posted on his official Twitter account. "It is my privilege to work alongside our student athletes, coaches and staff who embody our culture of hard work, discipline, and excellence -- on and off the field."

 

Tucker's contract is fully guaranteed. His buyout to leave Michigan State remains unchanged from his original contract: $2.5 million with annual decreases by $500,000.

The news comes five days after the Spartans dropped a 56-7 decision at Ohio State, Tucker's second loss in his past three games after Michigan State opened the year at 8-0. The surprising start landed the Spartans (9-2) in the top four of the College Football Playoff rankings before ultimately dropping.

"This is a process to build a championship-winning program," he wrote in his social media post. "A process that drives us to be better. A process that demands relentless soul and grit. A process that requires the support from Spartans across the globe. I am honored to be a part of the Spartan process today, and for years to come."

Clearly, the Big Ten school believes in that process.

"Mel Tucker has been an outstanding addition to our Spartan Athletic program," university president Samuel L. Stanley Jr., M.D., said in the school's announcement. "In less than two years, his leadership has already resulted in a program competing for top honors, and I'm impressed by his intensity and drive. Spartan fans around the country are enjoying the success of this year's football program and we look forward to many more successful seasons, competing at the highest levels under Coach Tucker."

According to the school's news release, Tucker's contract includes "non-performance related compensation of $9.5 million per year, including a $5.9 million base, $3.2 million in supplemental compensation for media and personal appearances, plus a $400,000 contingent annual bonus. The contract expires on January 15, 2032."

Only Alabama's Nick Saban, one of Tucker's mentors, who makes $9,753,221 a year, is paid more on an annual basis, according to the USA Today coaches' salaries database. And Tucker's 10-year deal puts him in select company with two other coaches on the same term: Clemson's Dabo Swinney and Texas A&M's Jimbo Fisher. Swinney's contract is worth $92 million and Fisher's deal will pay him more than $9 million a year, starting in 2022.

Last week, Tucker said Michigan State is a destination job and that he never intended to "just pass through" on his way to another program.

Speaking on The Draymond Green Show with Green, a former basketball star at Michigan State now with the Golden State Warriors, Tucker made his first comments last week since the Detroit Free Press reported the two sides were working on the eventual final terms.

"I made it clear in my initial press conferences that I thought Michigan State was a destination job and not a stepping stone," Tucker, in his second season in East Lansing, Michigan, told Green, who played for the Spartans from 2008 to 2012. "It was never my intention to come here and just pass through. I believe that we're building something special here. I have tremendous support here to do that, and we're on the right track."

Tucker, 49, mentioned his roots in the Big Ten as a former Wisconsin player and a native of Cleveland who started his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Michigan State for then-coach Nick Saban. He also spent 2001 to 2004 as a defensive assistant at Ohio State.

Tucker's original deal was scheduled to run through the 2024 season, carrying a $5.56 million annual salary. In February 2020, he was hired after only one season at Colorado to replace longtime Spartans coach Mark Dantonio.

Tucker had been mentioned as a potential candidate for the coaching vacancy at LSU, which announced Oct. 17 that coach Ed Orgeron would not return in 2022.

The Spartans will close the regular season on Saturday, seeking their 10th win, with a home game against Penn State (7-4).

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Mel Tucker's huge win over rival Michigan

Cory Linsner 

October 31, 2021 1:32 pm ET

Mel Tucker has become the first coach in Michigan State history to win his first two games against in-state rival Michigan. It was a massive win for the Spartans to improve to 8-0 and position themselves to compete for a Big Ten title in the month of November.

Michigan State overcame a 16-point deficit in the game, at one point trailing 30-14 late in the third quarter, and ended the game on a 23-3 run, taking home the win 37-33.

An emotional win for the Michigan State football program, and a statement win for Mel Tucker’s tenure at the helm in East Lansing.

Biggest surprises, disappointments so far in Big Ten

 

Kevin Brockway | CNHI Sports Indiana
September 28, 2021

Michigan State players celebrate following their overtime win against Nebraska on Saturday in East Lansing, Michigan.

Al Goldis | Associated Press

    

BLOOMINGTON – Through the first month of the season, Big Ten football has produced some head-scratching results.

The league doesn’t look as top-heavy as anticipated, with Ohio State falling at home to Oregon for its first regular season loss since falling to Purdue in 2018. Penn State has posted the conference’s best non-conference win to date, knocking off Auburn in a night affair in Happy Valley.

Nebraska is still Nebraska, struggling to find its way under fourth-year coach Scott Frost. Illinois is off to a 1-4 start under first-year coach Bret Bielema, unable to capitalize on the momentum from its season-opening win over Nebraska. Iowa is the early frontrunner in the Big Ten West, capitalizing on nine turnovers forced through its first four games to get off to a 4-0 start.

Here’s a look at the three biggest surprises through the first month of the season and three biggest disappointments:

SURPRISES

1. Michigan State: The Spartans are off a 4-0 start when some preseason magazines predicted they could end up last in the Big Ten East. Kenneth Walker III has made an impact for MSU, leading the Big Ten in rushing at 138.5 yards per game.

Michigan State opened the season with an impressive win at Northwestern, then went down to Miami and pummeled the Hurricanes 38-17. Last Saturday, Michigan State found a way to beat Nebraska 23-20 in overtime despite being outgained 442-254, thanks to a fourth-quarter punt return by Jayden Reed to tie the game and a Matt Coghlin field goal to win it.

Mel Tucker is doing a nice job in the second year of the MSU rebuild and is the early frontrunner for Big Ten coach of the year

2. Maryland: Quarterback Taulia Tagovailoa is playing at a high level for the Terrapins, leading the Big Ten in passing at 335 yards per game. Maryland has posted wins over West Virginia and Illinois on its way to a 4-0 start, but a bigger test will come Friday hosting No. 5 Iowa.

3. Purdue: Off to a 3-1 start, the Boilermakers are winning games with defense, with the three-headed defensive coordinator duties of Brad Lambert, Ron English and Mark Hagen working effectively.

Purdue ranks fourth in the Big Ten in scoring defense (14.3 points per game) and fifth in total defense (298.5 yards allowed).

Standout defensive end George Karlaftis is healthy and has posted two sacks through Purdue’s first four games.

Getting wide receiver David Bell back from a brutal concussion sustained in Purdue’s lone loss at Notre Dame will be critical to the offense for the second half of the season.

DISAPPOINTMENTS

1. Wisconsin: The two losses for the Badgers have come at home against Penn State and in Chicago against Notre Dame. In both games, quarterback Graham Mertz struggled, posting a touchdown-to-interception ratio of 1-6.

Wisconsin also has been just so-so establishing the run, averaging 203.3 yards rushing with five rushing TDs.

Mertz will need to raise his level of play with No. 14 Michigan coming to town Saturday.

2. Indiana: The Hoosiers entered the 2021 season with a preseason No. 17 ranking, but that quickly went by the wayside following a 34-6 loss at Iowa.

IU also self-destructed with four turnovers in a 38-24 home loss to Cincinnati, blowing an early 14-point lead.

IU quarterback Michael Penix Jr., coming off his second torn ACL rehab in three years, looked back to his old self with 373 passing yards at Western Kentucky. But Penix will face a more ferocious pass rush Saturday at No. 4 Penn State and needs to prove he can make better decisions with bodies coming at him.

3. Ohio State: The home loss to Oregon may not look as bad if the Ducks win the Pac-12 and emerge as a College Football Playoff team. But something is amiss in Columbus.

Quarterback C.J. Stroud was held out of Ohio State’s 59-7 win over Akron, perhaps due to injury or perhaps for head coach Ryan Day to evaluate the other quarterbacks on the roster.

Also, OSU linebacker K’Vaughn Pope quit in the middle of the Akron game, upset about playing time after being subbed out. Pope threw his gloves into the stands before leaving the field.

Stroud is expected to return for OSU’s next game at Rutgers on Saturday, but a porous defense must show signs of progress before an Oct. 30 showdown against No. 4 Penn State.

 

Michigan State football's Mel Tucker named Dodd Trophy national coach of week

 

Chris Solari

Detroit Free Press

First-year Michigan State football coach Mel Tucker was named The Dodd Trophy's national coach of the week Tuesday.

The Spartans upset then-No. 13 Northwestern on Saturday, 29-20, in East Lansing. The Dodd Trophy's weekly award goes to a coach "who led his team to a significant victory during the previous week, while also embodying the award’s three pillars of scholarship, leadership and integrity."

It was MSU's first win over a team in the College Football Playoff's top 10 since the Spartans beat Penn State in 2017.

 “Coach Tucker is already leaving his mark at Michigan State with two marquee wins during his first season,” Jim Terry, chairman of the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Foundation, said in a statement. “Coach Dodd believed every game was important, but there’s no doubt that he would admire how Coach Tucker has been able to motivate his team against some of its toughest competition this season.”

Tucker is 4-3 against teams ranked in the AP Top 25, including a 2-1 record at Michigan State. Four of his seven wins as a college head coach in his first two seasons have come against ranked opponents. 

The Spartans (2-3) are scheduled to host No. 4 Ohio State (4-0) at noon Saturday at Spartan Stadium.

Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari. Read more on the Michigan State Spartans and sign up for our Spartans newsletter.

Kirk Herbstreit unveils top-performing teams of the weekend

 

ByAUSTIN NIVISON Nov 30, 2:56 PM

 

The past weekend in college football saw a number of teams step up and notch some big wins. On Monday, ESPN college football expert Kirk Herbstreit recognized those teams for their efforts.

Whether it was a top team asserting its dominance or an underdog surprising a contender, there were a number of games that caught Herbstreit’s eye. A couple days after the dust settled, Herbstreit went on Twitter to highlight the teams that were at the top of their game over the weekend.

Let’s take a look at Herbstreit’s top performing teams from last week.

4. MICHIGAN STATE SPARTANS

(Photo: Sean Scherer, 247Sports)

Ranked No. 8 in the initial College Football Playoff rankings, Northwestern had eyes on a potential run at a national championship. However, the Spartans had other ideas. Michigan State jumped out to a 17-0 lead over the Wildcats and managed to hang on from there for a 29-20 win. The Spartans dashed Northwestern’s playoff hopes, and they got another signature win in Mel Tucker’s first season as the head coach of the program.

5 surprising findings from college football coaches salaries report

 

Steve BerkowitzTom Schad

USA TODAY

Published 11:37 a.m. ET Oct 14, 2020 | Updated 9:27 a.m. ET Oct 15, 2020

First-year Michigan State coach Mel Tucker’s pay has more than doubled from a year ago, with his total compensation at $5.06 million this season.

 

Dozens of head coaches across the Football Bowl Subdivision have taken pay cuts this year as schools deal with the financial fallout of the coronavirus pandemic.

But even with those reductions, they're still making more money than ever.

USA TODAY Sports' annual review of coaches' compensation found that the average total pay for FBS head coaches in 2020-21 is $2.7 million, a 1.1% increase from last year's average. Those figures include the pay reductions that some coaches are taking this year.

In the absence of a global pandemic, the 122 FBS coaches for whom USA TODAY Sports could obtain scheduled compensation figures would have made $2.79 million on average, a 4.5% jump from last year. 

Alabama's Nick Saban, who is slated to make $9.3 million, is once again the highest-paid coach in the country, followed by LSU's Ed Orgeron ($8.9 million) and Clemson's Dabo Swinney ($8.3 million). Saban has now been college football's highest-paid coach in seven of the past nine years.

Here are five other findings from the latest coaches' compensation data, which USA TODAY Sports has been compiling and analyzing on an annual basis since 2006.

► USA TODAY Sports found some trends in pay cuts being taken by coaches in different conferences. For example, every public-school head coach in both the Big 12 and Big Ten took a voluntary pay reduction in the wake of the pandemic. In the SEC, cuts have been rare, affecting coaches at only four of the 13 public schools: Arkansas, Missouri, Ole Miss and South Carolina.

The Group of Five, meanwhile, had a few interesting outliers. Only one public-school head coach in the Mountain West, Boise State's Bryan Harsin, has taken a voluntary pay cut. And in the MAC, only one coach (Buffalo's Lance Leipold) has not.

► It's not surprising that there is a difference in coaching salaries between Power Five schools and Group of Five schools, but the size of the gap is notable. This year, the average Power Five coach is making nearly $4.4 million in total compensation – more than four times the compensation for the average Group of Five coach.

► Buyout clauses are still booming. This year, at least five coaches would be owed $30 million or more if they were fired without cause by Dec. 1, led by Texas A&M's Jimbo Fisher ($53.1 million). And more than half of Power Five coaches (33) have buyouts of $10 million or more.

► Nothing helps a coach's wallet like a national championship run. LSU coach Ed Orgeron accrued more than $1.77 million in bonuses last year, which means he made more in bonus payments alone than at least 50 FBS coaches made in total compensation during the same time period.

► It's good to be first-year Michigan State coach Mel Tucker. Tucker's pay has more than doubled from a year ago, when he held the same position at Colorado, and increased six-fold since 2017, when he was an assistant at Georgia. His total compensation for 2020 ($5.06 million) ranks 14th in USA TODAY Sports' database.

Ditto for Ryan Day. Three years ago, Day was making $400,000 as an assistant coach at Ohio State. Now, he's due to make $5.6 million in total compensation in 2020, and his pay will climb to $7.6 million by 2022.

Follow Steve Berkowitz on Twitter @ByBerkowitz. Contact Tom Schad at tschad@usatoday.com or on Twitter @Tom_Schad.