Cubit guided the Fighting Illini to a 5-7 record on an interim basis last season after taking over just before the start of the season when the school fired Tim Beckman.
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AD Josh Whitman also announced the firing of HC Bill Cubit on Saturday, but he’s not the only Cubit heading to the unemployment line.
“Bill is a good man and a good football coach”. Cubit’s son Ryan, the Illini’s offensive coordinator, was also dismissed.
If not Smith, the most frequently chattered-about names seem to be Western Michigan’s P.J. Fleck, an IL native, and Youngstown State’s Bo Pelini, a Big Ten veteran.
Before hiring a new athletic director, IL had signed Cubit to a two-year contract in November. Whitman said at a press conference Saturday, denying that Cubit’s ouster was related to the allegations of player mistreatment that cost Beckman his job. Despite an 11-5 record in 2012, Smith was sacked and sat out the 2013 season before getting hired by the Buccaneers as their head coach in 2014.
“It’s not ideal to have a bunch of head coaches”, Dudek said in an interview.
Due to the timing of the decision, spring football practice – which was slated to commence Friday – will be delayed until a head coaching hire has been made. It’s broader than you might expect, with consistent advancement as a position coach from 1983 at Tulsa to 1995 at Ohio State, but that was a long time ago.
“I appreciate the leadership that Bill Cubit provided our football program during what has been, unquestionably, a very tumultuous time”, Whitman said per the university’s official site.
IL has been a place loaded with turmoil over the past year.
Beckman lost his job after a law firm hired by the university to investigate players’ allegations concluded the head coach had interfered in medical decisions and pressured players to play through injuries.
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The lawsuit against women’s basketball coach Matt Bollant, Thomas and the university is ongoing.
