UCLA tried, but PJ Fleck will coach the Gophers in 2024

When former UCLA head coach Chip Kelly accepted the offensive coordinator position at Ohio State on Friday, national college football reporter Brett McMurphy mentioned Gophers head coach PJ Fleck as a “top candidate.” That day, I wrote a story out-lining some reasons why he could leave Dinkytown or why he might stay.

Just over 24 hours later, Fleck Tweeted, “Honored to be the Head Football Coach at the University of Minnesota!! Ready for an ELITE 2024 season!! Now, back to our wedding anniversary trip!! #RTB #HYPRR #SkiUMah.” Fleck is on currently on a wedding anniversary trip with his wife Heather in Mexico. This quickly shut down any idea that he would bolt for Westwood.

The Bruins acted fast as the officially announced DeShaun Foster as their next head coach Monday afternoon. I mentioned Foster as a name that was the most likely route that UCLA could go given the timing of the hire. Moving away from a “big money” guy like Chip Kelly, Foster (with no head coach experience) will provide the program with an in-expensive risk as they head into a brand new conference in 2024.

Longtime CBS college football reporter Dennis Dodd reported today that Fleck was a “top choice” at UCLA and “it’s not clear why a deal did not get done.” ESPN’s top college football reporter Pete Thamel reported that, “there was a pool of 11 candidates interviewed by UCLA, many of whom were sitting head coaches.” Based on all that information, one could assume that Fleck was under strong consideration for the position. I am not reporting on any information that Fleck reciprocated interest nor that he interviewed for the job, but when there is smoke, there is typically fire.

How should Gophers fans feel?:

If UCLA’s goal was to find a create a Midwest rival in the new Big Ten, I think they’ve done a pretty good job. If you’re a member of the PJ Fleck fan club, you could easily just brush of these “rumors” as “rumors” and go on with your regular scheduled program. At the end of the day, they’re just rumors, but someone has to feed these very reputable national reporters with the information they’re reporting. Brett McMurphy did not just randomly decide to put PJ Fleck’s name in his original tweet, someone gave him that information. When this happens it tends to be someone like an agent attempting to find another bargaining tool for an extension or raise. This is fairly widely known information, but it’s worth mentioning again.

The fact that Fleck shut down the rumors nearly 24 hours after they started, tells me that he was aware of the situation for much longer than that. I don’t know if he was ever strongly considering heading to UCLA, but there is a very good chance that wanted to know his standing amongst the national coaching landscape and him and his agent wanted to just send out some “feelers.” On Friday, I mentioned that a situation like this could be one that I could see Fleck leaving Minnesota for, but I just don’t think this situation was right.

I personally think it would be naive to just move on from this smoke like nothing happened. Fleck has been tied to dozens of job openings since he arrived at Minnesota in 2017, but there is a good argument this was the loudest noise. He never had to publicly mention that he will stay with the program previously. The fact that this all came after his worst season since year one, is a lot more than a coincidence. I would like to reiterate that there is a good chance Fleck was never close to leaving, but all of this noise proves that he standing within the program might not be as ironclad as it was a few seasons ago.