UMass fires football coach Kevin Morris; seeks 'momentum' in move to FBS
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AMHERST - When the University of Massachusetts football program starts play next season at its new level and in its new league, it will have a new head coach at the helm.
UMass fired coach Kevin Morris Monday after three seasons and will begin a national search for his replacement immediately.
UMass just completed the first of two transition years as it makes the move from the Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA) to the Bowl Subdivision (formerly (I-A) of Division I football and the Mid-American Conference. UMass athletic director John McCutcheon said the upgrade played a key role in the school's decision to fire Morris.
"It's a very big part of this decision," McCutcheon said. "Where we are with our transition to (the FBS) and the MAC, we need to be building momentum. With a losing record this year, and the record we had last year (6-5), and some of the losses we had we just weren't making the progress that we felt we needed to make. It was called for. That's why we're making the move."
Morris won 16 games and lost 17 in three seasons at UMass and his teams were 10-14 in the Colonial Athletic Association. The Minutemen ended their 5-6 season in 2011 with a 34-17 loss to James Madison on Saturday.
UMass had just one losing season in 11 years before Morris took over as head coach, but had two 5-6 seasons during his three-year tenure.
Morris issued a statement through UMass on Monday:
"I was looking forward to taking UMass to the Football Bowl Subdivision and was building the program to do just that. The players here are willing to do the work and will be ready to compete at the highest level. I am disappointed that my staff will not be able to finish what they started. They are an outstanding group of coaches and were tireless workers in effort to give the student-athletes the best possible college football experience. John McCutcheon felt it was time for a change and although I am disappointed with the decision, I do thank him and his staff for the opportunity to help shape the lives of UMass football players."
Morris had two years remaining on his initial five-year contract that he signed when he was hired in 2009. McCutcheon said it will cost approximately $475,000 to buy out Morris and just over $600,000 for the entire staff which is expected to be let go.
McCutcheon said that it began to be apparent to him that a change would be necessary near midseason.
"We've been evaluating for some time," McCutcheon said. "It was never one game or one play, but as we got into the second half of this season, it was getting more and more clear that we weren't getting the momentum and heading in the direction we wanted to go."
He said he has candidates in mind and expects to expand the list.
McCutcheon said there were no hard and fast set of qualifications he requires in a candidate, but listed some preferences he had for the next UMass football coach.
"We want somebody who is going to be the face of this program, the leader of this program. You could almost say the CEO of this program as we move forward in that transition. They're going to need to have a lot of energy, a lot of charisma.
"They need to be recruiting players, the public and a lot of different groups for that matter," McCutcheon added. "We need them to be able to energize our student population, our current fan base, a new fan base... we want them to reach out to as many different constituents as we can.
"There is no one perfect individual out there. Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses," he continued. "Somebody that has I-A experience that knows what is required to compete at that level would be a benefit. Head coaching experience would be a benefit. But I wouldn't say if they didn't have head coaching experience that it would take them out of consideration.
"It would be attractive to have someone that knows East Coast recruiting from Florida all the way up," McCutcehon said. "We want somebody who is experienced in a situation where they've had success and knows what it takes to be successful."
McCutcheon said that he and a soon-to-be-announced consulting committee will run the search. UMass has no plans to hire an outside search firm.
"There are a number of people I will contact to get input," said McCutcheon. "We want to have as diverse a pool as we can currently get. I already have a call in to the Black Coaches Association to see if they can provide us with a list of candidates that they know of that might fit what we're looking for. In any search we have we want to attract a broad net."
UMass currently has no African-American head coaches.
The next coach will likely have a considerably higher salary than the $200,000 paid to Morris.
McCutcheon said UMass would be in position to offer a salary comparable with the upper-tier teams in the Mid-American Conference. According to a 2010 USA Today report on Division I coaches salaries, only two of the other 11 MAC schools pay their coaches below $350,000 per season.
"We feel like we can put together a very competitive package particularly in relation to other MAC conference head coaches," McCutcheon said.
He said while a quick search would be ideal, that is not his first priority.
"We want to move it along as quickly as we can, but we want to get the right person," McCutcheon said. "A number of the people we'll be talking to will no doubt be involved in coaching whereever they may be right now and that could go on for some time if they're involved in bowl games... We have a list of folks we want to pursue and now that it became public we have a group of folks that will hopefully will start to pursue us. In fairly short order we can have conversations or at least contacts with folks."
Matt Vautour can be reached at mvautour@gazettenet.com. Follow UMass coverage on Twitter at twitter.com/GazetteUMass. Get UMass coverage delivered in your Facebook news feed at http://www.facebook.com/GazetteUMassCoverage.
