Posted on 09/13/2021 2:47:45 PM PDT by Fiji Hill
USC athletic director Mike Bohn announced Monday that Clay Helton is out as head coach of the Trojans.
Cornerbacks coach Donte Williams will serve as interim head coach for the remainder of the season. Bohn and Helton addressed the team and delivered the news during a regular Monday meeting.
“Clay is one of the finest human beings I have met in this industry, and he has been a tremendous role model and mentor to our young men,” Bohn said in a statement released by the USC Athletics department. “We appreciate his many years of service to our university and wish him nothing but the very best. Consistent with our values as an institution, he deserves the utmost respect from the Trojan Family during this transition.”
Helton took over as the permanent USC head coach in late-2015 after serving as interim for much of that season. He posted a 46-24 record and went 2-3 in bowl games (one win as an interim head coach). USC is coming off a blowout loss to Stanford, dropping its 2021 record to 1-1 and falling out of the national polls.
“Our university and its leadership are committed to winning national championships and restoring USC football to glory,” Bohn said in the statement. “I accept the enormous responsibility I have to our current and former players and the entire Trojan Family to live up to our incredible heritage.”
The firing comes just two games into the 2021 season, but this has been building. Helton helped the Trojans to a Rose Bowl win and a Pac-12 title in the 2016 and 2017 seasons, but USC went just 5-7 in 2018 and lost five games in 2019.
“As I committed to upon my arrival at USC, during the past two off-seasons we provided every resource necessary for our football program to compete for championships,” Bohn said in his message announcing the change. “The added resources carried significantly increased expectations for our team’s performance, and it is already evident that, despite the enhancements, those expectations would not be met without a change in leadership.”
Bohn said USC will begin a national search for its next permanent head coach.
All it took was one private message!
Seems like only yesterday when Bob was our DC for our 1996 Natty.
I would attribute it to job burnout as an umbrella title for a host of things. His passion was gone. His heart just didn't seem to be in it his last year. I've heard that he is disappointed in the direction that cfb is headed and he just wanted to do something different. Family is important to him and he is not willing to sacrifice it any more to his career. Plus, financially, he's set for life.
I think he just decided that he didn't want to do it anymore. He certainly wasn't forced out.
Good for him, then.
And as a Gator it’s what worries me with Mullen. I’ve heard things about how the UF fanbase is jumping on him with regards to how he’s handled the QBs, and now with the situation we have with Emory Jones and Anthony Richards, the things I see out there being said about Mullen frankly disgust me, as a Gator fan. It’s what drives coaches away, I know it’s what made Spurrier want to leave.
Once great programs, Texas and USC is where coaching careers go to die over the past 10 years. Those schools aren’t attractive as they once were. USC is surrounded by ghettos. Who wants 3-5 years of that.
You can add Nebraska to that list.
Blame the players
In hindsight, the Huskies should have done a full search when Coach Pete stepped down and I doubt Lake would have been the pick. I'm willing to give him a little while to see if he can turn this thing around. Saturday was not encouraging on the heels of the Montana debacle. I'm not optimistic that Lake can turn it around. With 20 starters coming back on a team that earned a slot in the conference championship game last year (only to have it taken by a covid outbreak), there is NO excuse for this level of putrid play. That has to be on the coach.
There are a lot of red flags waving around Montlake.
I always like to point out that Nick Saban lost to Louisiana-Monroe his first year at Bama. You basically have to give it a year for a new coach to instill a new culture on a program.
Peter Principle.
This was breaking news--just minutes old--when I posted it, and major sporting events are arguably news.
USC—University of Super Champions
Well they always clean up at the Gold Medal count in the Olympics.
Actually I (we) saw Mrs. S. first, kinda flittering around the place like she knew what she was doing. I thought to myself, "who is that lady, she doesn't like like she's from around here..."
About that time the Maitre D called her first name and she waved at her, and then stuck her head out the door and said "Bobby we've got a seat!" and then Bob gets out of the truck and walks in and they take their seats at the bar with Bob at the far end where no one can bug him. I don't blame him a bit.
Honestly though, it was really impressive the way she took care of business and ran interference for Bob, not heavy handed nor lording herself over people, just being cool about the whole thing. Bob too. Management knew they were coming of course... they just wanted breakfast, okay? :)
It wasn't always that way. As they rode to and from classes aboard trolley cars through the fields surrounding the campus during the 1890's, USC students would shoot rabbits.
Yes, Nebraska is another coache’s graveyard.
I was there in Arlington, TX when Helton started his first full season as USC head coach in 2016. USC received a 52-6 thunderfumpin’ from Bama after Bama’s first string QB was shelved for the backup QB — a man named Jalen Hurts.
Lou Holtz? Hardly. He is one of the finest men who ever coached.
University of Second Choice
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