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via coaching search
Cincinnati: I have learned that Cincinnati head coach Butch Jones has hired Holy Cross defensive coordinator Shannon Morrison to replace Kerry Coombs. Morrison just recently joined the Holy Cross staff after serving as the corners coach at Memphis the last couple of years.
Morrison has been coaching for 17 years at the college level. He spent the last two years aboard the fail boat that was Memphis Football under Larry Porter. For what's its worth Memphis had the worst secondary in the nation in 2010 and weren't much better in 2011. Prior to that he was the Co-Defensive Coordinator/DB coach at Bowling Green, ranked #56 in pass efficiency defense. And finally he was the LB/DB coach at Marshall under Mark Snyder who knows a thing or two about.
This is more than a little disconcerting to me. I would have really preferred to pluck a DB coach off the Nick Saban tree, but I suppose that most of them have jobs already. Morrison is a pretty good hire from where I am sitting. He might not have an ideal pedigree in terms of who he has worked for making his way up the ladder, but he isn't an unknown either.
Most importantly he will help the Bearcats forge deeper recruiting ties in Memphis. He recruited Memphis, Dallas and Georgia for the Tigers. Remember that for as much as Memphis sucked in the fall, they really won in February, which is impressive given just how much they sucked on the field.
This isn't a home run, but it is a solid, solid hire.