The South Carolina Gamecocks and quarterback LaNorris Sellers will have someone new in charge of play-calling duties next season, and it’s a name that Alabama football fans remember well.
On Tuesday, former Crimson Tide quarterback and head coach Mike Shula was promoted to offensive coordinator on coach Shane Beamer’s staff. Shula replaces Dowell Loggains, who recently accepted the head coaching job at Appalachian State.
According to various reports, Shula’s contract with South Carolina is for three years at $1.1 million a season. Shula had been an assistant coach in 2024, his first season with the Gamecocks’ program.
Before joining Beamer’s staff in Columbia, Shula had worked as an assistant coach in the NFL with a plethora of teams. Most notably, he was the Carolina Panthers’ offensive coordinator from 2013-17 during their run to Super Bowl 50 and was later the offensive coordinator for the New York Giants for two seasons (2018-19).
But Shula is best known in college football circles for his tenure as Alabama’s head coach beginning in the spring of 2003. He spent four seasons as coach, winning 10 games and the Cotton Bowl in 2005 before being fired after going just 6-6 the following season.
Shula’s firing led to Nick Saban being named Alabama’s head coach — and savior — in January 2007.
For a while, Shula was considered one of the most polarizing figures in the history of Alabama football. His detractors pointed to an 0-4 record against Auburn in the Iron Bowl, an offense that had become too predictable and vanilla, and a resistance to change.
Shula’s defenders recognized that he was placed in a no-win situation during his tenure in Tuscaloosa. At the time of Shula’s hiring, Alabama was suffering from great embarrassment over the fallout of the Mike Price scandal, which saw a head coach fired for unethical conduct before ever coaching his first official game.
The image of the Alabama football program had taken a severe beating in the public eye. Dennis Franchione, faced with crippling NCAA sanctions as the result of a major recruiting scandal he’d had nothing to do with, had jilted Alabama for Texas A&M the previous winter. Shula’s first season resulted in just four wins.
But the passing of time, and Alabama’s return to national prominence under Saban, has heeled most if not all wounds in regard to Shula.
Alabama will square off against Shula and the Gamecocks next season on Oct. 25 at Williams-Brice Stadium in Columbia.
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