Latest: Texas football making massive changes on coaching staff
Texas head coach Tom Herman is making sweeping changes through the coaching staff starting with his coordinators.
AUSTIN (KXAN) — Texas head coach Tom Herman is making sweeping changes through the coaching staff starting with his coordinators.
Herman is reassigning offensive coordinator Tim Beck within the coaching staff while receivers coach Drew Mehringer has been fired. Co-receivers coach Corby Meekins is shuffling to an off-the-field position, according to a release from Texas football.
The release says Beck will continue in his role as quarterbacks coach through the bowl game. A national search for his replacement as offensive coordinator will begin immediately.
Defensive coordinator Todd Orlando has also been fired.
Co-defensive coordinator and safeties coach Craig Naivar will assume the defensive coordinator responsibilities on an interim basis, while UT conducts a national search for Orlando’s replacement, per the release.
“After taking time, looking back and evaluating the season in its totality, I am very disappointed in our performance in a number of areas in 2019,” Herman said. “7-5 will never be our standard at Texas and I take full responsibility for any and all of our shortcomings and know we need to do a better job coaching across the board. With that said, I do believe the future is very bright, have decided to make some changes to our staff as we head into bowl preparation and look to finish strong in the final weeks of fall recruiting.”
Two analysts with the UT football support staff will take over coaching roles for the bowl game. Andre Coleman will serve as the interim receivers coach. Jeremiah George will serve as the interim linebackers coach.
In a savvy move by Herman, recruiting director Bryan Carrington will move into one of the 10 full-time assistant coaching roles on an interim basis in order to go on the road to assist with recruiting, per the release.
Since his debut year at Texas, Orlando’s defense has steadily declined into one of the worst units in college football.
The Longhorns ranked No. 108 in total defense, No. 75 in scoring defense and nearly dead last in the country in passing defense at No. 127 this season.
The Texas offense ranked nationally in the top 20 of most statistical categories including scoring, total offense and the efficiency metric SP+. However, the unit has been under fire in recent weeks due to a lack of consistency and a failure to run the football effectively.
Herman told the media following the Texas Tech win that the players are returning Sunday night from a weekend off and will meet with the coaching staff.