The UMass job is open. Head coach Don Brown was fired on Monday, ending his second stint at the school with a 6-18 record.
Brown previously coached the team at the Football Championship Subdivision level from 2004 to 2008, reaching an FCS national championship game. But he could never get it going at the Football Bowl Subdivision level. Nobody has gotten it going at UMass since the program moved up to the FBS. But the Minutemen are heading back to the MAC next season and believe their coaching opening is better than it has been in the past.
So how good is the UMass job? What names could get in the mix? Based on conversations with industry sources, here is a report card for the job and the potential candidates to watch.
Recent history/tradition: D
UMass has been the worst team in the FBS since it moved up in 2012. The Minutemen haven’t won more than four games in a season, and they’ve only won four games twice. They’ve spent all but four of those years as an independent, without a conference championship to even compete for, though that will change next year in the MAC. But the program had a a winning tradition before FBS. It won the FCS national championship in 1998 and played for another in 2006. That FCS success keeps this grade from being an F, but the Minutemen have done nothing at the FBS level. They’ve stopped playing home games at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro and stayed on campus, at least.
On-field outlook: D+
UMass actually ranks 82nd in 247Sports’ Team Talent rankings, on the upper end of the Group of 5, with nine former four-star recruits on the roster through the transfer portal. But some of them still haven’t panned out, the best players on this year’s team will be out of eligibility, including receiver Jakobie Keeney-James (an Eastern Washington transfer), and the defense is full of seniors. The next coach will have to use the portal to work on this roster and likely find a new quarterback.
Money matters: C
Brown’s $880,000 salary would’ve ranked in the upper half of the MAC, and the expectation is that UMass will be able to pay over $1 million this time around, almost double what previous head coach Walt Bell was paid. But it’s still closer to the lower end of the G5, and it may not be enough to lure Power 4 coordinators. The football program’s operating expenses were around $11 million in 2022-23, according to Sportico’s database, which would also be near the top of the MAC. A football building attached to the stadium opened in 2014 and was renovated in 2021 with a new weight room, and the school added a bubble for indoor practice in 2019. People around the program believe UMass will also top the MAC in name, image and likeness money, around $2 million for football, when it joins the conference.
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University stability: C+
After years of conference purgatory, the move to the MAC will be a much-needed step for the program. Independence hurt recruiting and coaching pools in the past. UMass was briefly in the MAC from 2012 to ’15, but it was among the conference’s lowest spenders and worst teams. This time around, it’ll be near the top financially. Athletic director Ryan Bamford has been there since 2015, and the school hired a new chancellor in 2023. There is more school support for football than there has been in a long time. Will it help?
Coach pool: C
Rutgers defensive coordinator Joe Harasymiak has been in the mix for G5 head coaching jobs in the past. He went 20-15 as Maine’s head coach from 2016 to ’18, including a 10-win season, after five years as an assistant there. He’s from New Jersey and played college ball at Springfield in Massachusetts.
Syracuse quarterbacks coach Nunzio Campanile is a New Jersey native who spent four years at Rutgers and was a New Jersey high school coach for 18 years before that, so he knows the Northeast. He went 1-7 as Rutgers’ interim head coach in 2019 and 1-1 as Syracuse’s interim head coach last year before being retained by Fran Brown, and he’s done a good job with Kyle McCord this season.
Missouri quarterbacks coach Sean Gleeson is a Northeast native who was previously the offensive coordinator at Rutgers, Oklahoma State and Princeton. He played quarterback at Williams College in Massachusetts, and he’s been at Mizzou for the last two seasons.
Boston College offensive coordinator Will Lawing has been Bill O’Brien’s right-hand man for a decade, coaching with him at Penn State, the Houston Texans, Alabama, the New England Patriots and now BC, where the Eagles are 5-5.
Stony Brook head coach Billy Cosh inherited an 0-10 program this year and has the Seawolves at 8-3 and ranked in the FCS top 20. Cosh was previously the offensive coordinator at Western Michigan and Richmond.
New Hampshire head coach Rick Santos is a Massachusetts native who is 22-13 in his stint as head coach, with a top-15 appearance in 2022 and a top-25 team now. He’s spent his entire coaching career in the Northeast.
Kutztown head coach Jim Clements has been winning big in the Division II ranks. He’s 155-52 as a head coach, including 53-10 since 2019, and has Kutztown ranked No. 3 with an 11-0 record. If you’re looking for another Lance Leipold or Kalen DeBoer to rise up from the lower levels, perhaps Clements could be that coach.
Lehigh head coach Kevin Cahill has the Mountain Hawks at 7-3 this year in his second season, the program’s first winning season since 2016. He’s a New York native who previously coached at Yale and Maine.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive coordinator Liam Coen would be an unlikely hire, given his current gig, but he’s a former UMass quarterback and coached there from 2014 to ’15.
West Virginia head coach Neal Brown wouldn’t leave Morgantown for UMass, but if the Mountaineers make a change and Brown becomes available, maybe this could be a fit. Brown played at UMass for two years and spent a year on staff. He went 35-16 as Troy’s head coach, and he’s 36-34 at West Virginia right now.
Overall grade: D+
The job does look a lot better on paper than it used to be. UMass is spending and staffing at a much higher level than it used to, facilities have improved and moving to the MAC should bring some needed stability. But there’s been zero FBS success here, and we’ll have to see it before we can believe it.
(Photo: Omar Rawlings / Getty Images)
