Mel Tucker hired by Michigan State
After the shocking retirement of Mark Dantonio, Michigan State has tapped Colorado’s Mel Tucker as its next head football coach. Tucker takes over the Spartans after 1 year in Boulder. He will reportedly receive a 6 year contract worth at least $5.5 million and have $6 million for hiring a staff.
Coach Tucker returns to the school that gave him his coaching start under Nick Saban in the late 1990s. He was on the staff there and at Ohio State in the early 2000s with Coach Dantonio. He also replaced Dantonio when he go the head job at Cincinnati.
Tucker has also been an NFL defensive coordinator in Cleveland, Chicago, and Jacksonville. He was named interim head coach of the Jaguars in 2012 and spent the following year in Chicago before returning to the college ranks.
Alabama hired Tucker as assistant head coach/defensive backs coach, which he turned into a 3 year stint as the DC for Georgia. These stops gave him the opportunities to coach in the college football playoff and national championships.
With how badly MSU’s coaching search seemed to be plummeting, Mel Tucker is a fantastic hire. They get a head coach with NFL and college experience with some incredibly successful mentors. Nick Saban even called the Board of Trustees to endorse Tucker.
MSU also needed to improve its recruiting efforts. Tucker himself has been rated as one of the country’s top 20 recruiters three times. There are also reports that the Spartans offered a substantial deal to Kentucky’s Vince Marrow (which he has since turned down) and have added Colorado’s Director of Player Personnel, Geoff Martzen.
Just 24 hours prior to the announcement, this entire search seemed like a fail. Now, it seems like a victory.