SEC jobs are black holes of coaching

SEC jobs are black holes of coaching

Published on FS South | shared via feedly

Some call it a siren's song. Others would call it a black hole.

SEC coaching has become a bit of both depending on your perspective. If you are a fan, the jobs offered at college football's top conference are the pinnacle of the sport: a place where a good football man can gain wealth and status that would make the Sun King blush. But if you are on the outside looking in, the conference can seem like a dense vortex where everything enters but nothing ever escapes. Recent news out of region only bolsters both claims. 

Nobody thought Bret Bielema would leave Wisconsin, especially after making his third consecutive trip to the Rose Bowl. The Big Ten was once the conference every great coach aspired to land. Now, it's a training ground for 4-8 SEC programs. 

 Read the rest here.

There are two very good reasons why the SEC attracts so many of the top coaching candidates in the country: Money and demographics. Money for facilities, recruiting budgets, robust staffs and salaries for top assistant coaches. No other conference has schools with these resources. Even small schools like Mississippi State can commit greater resources than larger schools in other parts of the country.

Bielema was quoted as saying that at Wisconsin, he was limited to $300,000 per assistant coach. In the SEC, that's a bonus, not a salary.

The demographics are right, too. The southeast is already the most fertile recruiting territory in the land, and the states with the highest population growth rates are all within a quick private plane ride away. If you can recruit in states like Texas, Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas, you'll have a chance to develop some of the country's best raw talent into potential championship contenders.

If you can win here, you can win anywhere. Right, Urban?