Florida Atlantic fired football coach Tom Herman on Monday, two days after the Owls dropped their fifth consecutive game, multiple people briefed on the decision confirmed.
Herman was 2-8 this season and 6-16 overall. The Year 2 lowlights included a 44-21 home defeat against South Florida (marked by a tense postgame handshake with USF coach Alex Golesh) and a 34-point thrashing at UConn. On Saturday, FAU lost in overtime to Temple, which fired its coach, Stan Drayton, on Sunday.
FAU hired Herman to replace Willie Taggart after the 2022 season. It was an opportunity for Herman to rejuvenate his head coaching career after an unsuccessful 32-18 run at Texas (plus time as an analyst for the Chicago Bears and on the CBS Sports Network). Herman had experience in the American Athletic Conference, going 22-4 with an AAC championship in two seasons at Houston.
But Herman never took off in south Florida. FAU went 3-11 in the AAC under his watch.
Herman becomes the Owls’ latest short-lived coach. Other than the program’s architect and first coach, Howard Schnellenberger, no FAU coach has lasted more than three seasons. Only one, Lane Kiffin, had a winning record.
The expectation in the industry was that Herman, 49, would likely end up as an offensive coordinator for a Power Four conference. He won a national title as Ohio State’s offensive coordinator in 2014 and previously held that role at Iowa State.
Herman’s buyout is about $4 million, according to USA Today’s coaching database.
CBS and 247Sports first reported the news of Herman’s firing.
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