Report: Jim McElwain emerging as candidate at Missouri

Could Florida soon be facing two of its former football coaches on an annual basis?

That certainly seems to be a possibility based on the latest report from FootballScoop.com about one of the job openings in the SEC. FootballScoop reports that Central Michigan coach Jim McElwain is one of the coaches emerging as a candidate for the Missouri job following the firing of Barry Odom, along with Tulane's Willie Fritz, Louisiana Tech's Skip Holtz, Air Force's Troy Calhoun, Army's Jeff Monken and Charlotte's Will Healy.

McElwain is coming off a terrific season at Central Michigan that has earned him some consideration for various Coach of the Year awards.

He has led the Chippewas to a MAC West title and an 8-4 regular season after the team went just 1-11 a year ago. McElwain spent one year as a receivers coach at Michigan following a failed stint at Florida before taking his third FBS head coaching job.

He's had success virtually everywhere he's been, too, despite the disaster of a 2017 season that saw him quickly torpedo his opportunity with the Gators.

McElwain first rose to prominence in the FBS coaching ranks when he took over at Colorado State after a terrific run as offensive coordinator with Nick Saban at Alabama. He inherited a Rams squad that had gone 3-9 for three straight seasons, quickly guiding the program to a major turnaround by his second and third year.

After finishing 4-8 in his inaugural campaign at Colorado State, McElwain led the Rams to an 8-6 season and then a 10-2 regular season in 2014 that allowed him the platform to jump to Florida.

Then UF athletics director Jeremy Foley leaped at the opportunity, tabbing McElwain to replace Will Muschamp, searching for an offensive-minded head coach that could resurrect the Florida offense.

Though McElwain was extremely successful in his first two years at Florida -- he became the first SEC coach ever to reach back-to-back SEC title games in his first two seasons -- the offense never did turn around. And once Florida's insane level of defensive talent left by Muschamp tailed off, Florida faltered and finished 4-8 in 2017, prompting McElwain's ouster.

His departure from Florida was about more than just wins and losses, though. McElwain infamously claimed just prior to the Georgia game in 2017 that he and members of the UF program had received death threats. When asked by the administration to provide details, McElwain declined. That furthered the divide in an already strained relationship with current Florida athletics director Scott Stricklin, who ultimately decided to move on from McElwain.

So it'd certainly be interesting to see McElwain back in the SEC East at Missouri.

It's also not entirely unprecedented for Florida to face a former football coach within the SEC East. The Gators did that for 11 years when Steve Spurrier returned to the college sidelines after a stint with the Washington Redskins, coaching the South Carolina Gamecocks for 11 years.

The Gamecocks wasted little time replacing Spurrier with another former Florida coach when Spurrier retired, too. Muschamp took over at South Carolina, and will retain his job at least for at least one more year, making it 16 straight years now that the Gators have faced off against a former coach.

Should McElwain get the Missouri job, that trend could easily stretch all the way to two decades.

That's certainly an intriguing possibility, given how volatile McElwain's relationship with the Florida administration and the UF fanbase was. It'll be interesting to see if McElwain can parlay his recent on-field results into another high-level FBS job, working around the obvious off-the-field snafu that ended his Florida tenure.

SOURCE: Goldkamp, Thomas. "Report: Jim McElwain emerging as candidate at Missouri." Swamp247 - 247Sports.com, 4 December 2019, https://247sports.com/college/florida/Article/Jim-McElwain-head-coach-candidate-Missouri-Tigers-139800779/