Dennis Dodd of CBS Sports has tabbed Georgia defensive coordinator Dan Lanning as a possible replacement for Les Miles at Kansas.
Head coach Les Miles and the University of Kansas agreed to part ways last week due to reports surfacing of inappropriate behavior and sexual harassment during his time at LSU (2005-2016).
Now, Kansas must find a new head football coach as spring football season approaches. Dennis Dodd of CBS Sports has included Georgia defensive coordinator Dan Lanning as a possible candidate to take over the Jayhawks.
“7. Dan Lanning, Georgia defensive coordinator: A budding star who has worked for Kirby Smart, Nick Saban and Mike Norvell. Texas and Florida State both reportedly took cracks at Lanning to be their DC in the last two seasons. Lanning knows the territory as a Kansas City native. He recruited Kansas jucos while at Arizona State under Todd Graham.”
As Dodd mentions, Lanning has received calls for other coaching positions for the last two seasons, most recently Texas. New Longhorns coach Steve Sarkisian reportedly offered the defensive coordinator position to Lanning, who elected to return to Athens and shortly after, received a pay raise of $450,000, which puts him in the upper echelon of assistant coach salaries at $1.7 million per year.
Lanning’s resume at Georgia is impressive. He led the 2019 Bulldogs to a No. 1 ranking in scoring defense, while ranking No. 3 in total defense. And in 2020, led Georgia to the No. 15 scoring defense and the No. 13 total defense in the country with several key starters going down with injuries.
Although Kansas will probably not pull Lanning away from Georgia, it’s only a matter of time before the right job opens up for him and Lanning decides to move on from Athens. Until then, the Bulldogs have one of the top teams in the country in 2021 and focus now has to be on a championship.
Kansas and Les Miles have agreed to part ways after a bombshell report concerning the coach’s time at LSU came out last week.
This Les Miles saga is going to get uglier before it gets better, it seems.
On Monday night, the University of Kansas announced that Miles and the school have “mutually agreed to part ways.”
“I am extremely disappointed for our university, fans and everyone involved with our football program,” Long said in a statement. “There is a lot of young talent on this football team, and I have no doubt we will identify the right individual to lead this program.”
Miles was placed on administrative leave on Friday after a USA TODAY Sports report broke that he had been alleged of inappropriate behavior toward females during his time at LSU to the point that he was banned from contacting them and, in 2013, then-LSU athletic director Joe Alleva came to the decision that he should be fired.
“This is certainly a difficult day for me and for my family,” Miles said in a statement on Monday. “I love this university and the young men in our football program. I have truly enjoyed being the head coach at KU and know that it is in a better place now than when I arrived.
“To our student-athletes, I want you to remember that you came to play for KU and earn a degree here. So, I implore you to stay and build on what we started and do all of the things we talked about doing together. There is a bright future for all of you and for KU Football.”
Les Miles certainly had me fooled into thinking he was one of the good ones over the years before the latest news dropped from LSU.
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For all that everyone knew other than the parties involved at LSU and possibly Kansas, Les Miles was a great guy. Quirky, funny, successful and the Mad Hatter in charge of the Tigers’ program.
That curtain has certainly been ripped down over the past few days as reports of his misconduct, both disgusting and terrifying, during his time at Baton Rouge along with the university’s efforts to cover it up have been revealed.
Listen, I was as fooled as everyone. When he spent three minutes chatting to me one year at SEC Media Days, I was won over. He was charming and, when he spoke later that day at the podium and talked about everything between human rights and his trip to Cuba, I was ready to declare myself a fan forever and, at an old job, once wrote that I wanted to travel Europe with the man.
See, we might never know who these coaches are other than what they appear to be. I’ve certainly learned that over the years. Through my job, I have had the fortune to meet a lot of coaches that I once only knew from the outside and get to see them as a person, not a coach. It is what I consider one of the luckiest things I get to do.
Some surprised me in the best of ways. Others were exactly how they seemed from a distance.
Yet we can all still be fooled, can’t we? Sure, I still have my opinions on coaches who I think don’t get it — hello, Dabo Swinney and Dan Mullen — and some that I would love to get some beers with, but the chances of me getting to know them for the person they truly are are slim.
I thought that Les Miles was one of the good ones. I genuinely thought that he truly cared despite the warning signs including the reinstatement of Jeremy Hill in 2013 being just one. He was a great politician that won you over with charm and self-deprecation.
He was the man who ate grass.
This mess won’t just affect Miles, either. The assistants at Kansas that he hired are now in trouble of losing their jobs and let’s not think of the people who hired him including athletic director Jeff Long.
As for LSU, that situation will have a fallout like we have hardly ever seen before. There was a lot of covering up for the benefit of the football program and to the detriment of the victims.
Miles was involved the entire time yet we fell for his zany press conferences and wrote him off as just another character in the line of characters in the game of college football.
At the height of his fame as Louisiana State University’s head football coach, Les Miles was accused of texting female students, taking them to his condo alone, making them feel uncomfortable and, on at least one occasion, kissing a student and suggesting they go to a hotel after telling her he could help her career, according to an internal investigative report released by LSU on Thursday.
The investigation, done by law firm Taylor Porter on behalf of LSU in 2013, did not find that Miles had sexual relationships with any of the women. But it found his behavior inappropriate. Miles strongly denied kissing the girl, according to the report. He said that he did nothing wrong and was simply mentoring young women at the university.
Miles also was accused by athletic department staff of saying that the female student workers who helped the football team lure top recruits needed to be attractive, blonde and fit, according to the investigative report. Existing student employees who did not meet this criteria should be given fewer hours or terminated, the report details.
