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SI.com ties Dana Holgorsen to Arizona State job

By Matthew Peaslee

FORT WORTH, TX - OCTOBER 07: Head coach Dana Holgorsen of the West Virginia Mountaineers reacts to a play against the TCU Horned Frogs in the fourth quarter at Amon G. Carter Stadium on October 7, 2017 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images)
FORT WORTH, TX - OCTOBER 07: Head coach Dana Holgorsen of the West Virginia Mountaineers reacts to a play against the TCU Horned Frogs in the fourth quarter at Amon G. Carter Stadium on October 7, 2017 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images) /
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Dana Holgorsen has been rumored to be interested in other coaching positions in the past. Now, he might just be tied to another coaching vacancy.

SI.com’s Bruce Feldman mentions Dana Holgorsen as a possible candidate for the open head coaching job at Arizona State as Todd Graham was recently fired from the position. There are now numerous coaching jobs available across the country, some even more high-profiled than ASU.

Which is why the rumor of Holgorsen to the Sun Devils is kind of perplexing. WVU to ASU seems like a lateral move, at best. West Virginia has a deep pedigree in the college football world and has even had more recent success than Arizona State. Maybe that’s why Holgorsen could be interested in the job.

However, Holgorsen would be the first person to admit that there is still a lot left to accomplish at West Virginia. When he took over the WVU football program in 2011, Dana Holgorsen was tasked with taking the Mountaineers to new heights. He was supposed to ease the transition from the Big East to the Big 12 and compete for conference and national titles right away. He hasn’t done that yet.

West Virginia’s play for competitiveness has been delayed. Since Dana Holgorsen took over the team, the Mountaineers’ play has been inconsistent and there really hasn’t been a signature win for the team in the past six seasons. He has gotten the job done, becoming bowl eligible five of these last six years, but the fanbase has been left wanting more each season.

In his SI.com piece, however, Feldman called Holgorsen’s performance “impressive.” Here’s why:

"The 46-year-old Holgorsen is considered one of the most creative minds in football. He is 53–36 in seven seasons at West Virginia. His teams are 17–8 the past two years, which is impressive considering WVU is one of the tougher jobs in the Big 12."

Feldman brings up a good points and it’s a point that needs to sink in with most of the West Virginia fanbase. The Mountaineers aren’t thought of as the class of the Big 12 Conference. Each year and each week, actually, the team must fight even harder for respectability because WVU is still relatively unknown in the Big 12 landscape. Being the newest program in a new area for the conference is hard enough, then the West Virginia football team has to go out and win games.

Holgorsen has done a good job in his tenure with the WVU football team, but the program has yet to reach its full potential. Dana Holgorsen still has his best days as a head coach in front of him, too. It would be a shame for him to go somewhere else and live up to his personal potential when he is still building something special in Morgantown.

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Other names Feldman mentioned for the open ASU job include former Texas A&M head coach Kevin Sumlin, Vanderbilt head coach Derek Mason, UCLA offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch, Michigan passing game coordinator Pep Hamilton, Baltimore Ravens assistant Greg Roman and Arizona Cardinals offensive coordinator Harold Goodwin, according to his story.

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