Minnesota will hire coach from Northern Illinois
By Phil Miller
STAR TRIBUNE (MINNEAPOLIS)
MINNEAPOLIS - Jerry Kill beat the Minnesota Gophers, and now he'll join them.
Kill, coach of Northern Illinois for three seasons, has accepted the coaching job at Minnesota and will be introduced at a news conference today.
Kill led the Huskies to a 34-23 victory over the Gophers on Sept. 25, en route to a 10-3 season.
Kill has a 23-16 record at Northern Illinois and led the Huskies to bowl games all three seasons, including the Humanitarian Bowl later this month. Before being hired at the DeKalb school, the 49-year-old was coach at Southern Illinois (55-32 in seven seasons), Emporia State (11-11 in two seasons) and Saginaw Valley State (38-14 in five seasons).
The hire comes on the seven-week anniversary of the firing of coach Tim Brewster, who was dismissed Oct. 17 after the Gophers lost six straight games to fall to 1-6. Offensive coordinator Jeff Horton finished the season, winning the final two games over Illinois and Iowa to go 2-3 and help Minnesota finish the year at 3-9.
Kill signed a five-year contract at Northern Illinois in 2007 that paid him $300,000 annually, and he received a raise to roughly $381,000 15 months ago, when he signed an extension through 2015. Contract details at Minnesota are not known, but Brewster earned roughly $1million annually.
Heh. I think Kill will work out fine for them. He's a meat-n-gravy type of coach that will get the Gophers back to the power running game they had under Mason (which also might be better suited to their new outdoor stadium).
What's funny is Minnesota fans complaining about the hire. Like the Gophers are the Gators and they're going to pull in someone huge.
My reason for posting this was the fact Minnesota said they were going to go after one of the name coaches and might have to open the purse a little more than in the past. I don't know a thing about Kill, I'm just sayin'. Maybe he'll be Goldy's Tress.
Yeah, they were making some waves early. But then I guess they remembered they were Minnesota.
I expected someone with a name that had a little more recognition. They said all along they were looking for an equivalent to the hiring of Tubby Smith. At least we can work in the coach's name when we say: Kill the Gophers!
Can you Kill something that is already dead?