Greg McElroy names potential candidates for Michigan State job

Michigan State is currently without head coach Mel Tucker while it concludes a Title IX investigation of alleged sexual harassment, and the program could very well be hiring a new coach later this fall.

ESPN analyst Greg McElroy took some time on his show recently to open up on some candidates he thinks the Spartans should check out.

“Duke head coach Mike Elko is at the top of just about everybody’s list,” McElroy said. “The guy has done an amazing job at Duke, a terrific, terrific coach. And just on an X O standpoint, on a scheme standpoint, he’s excellent. Universally respected and I do think will be pretty much offered a handful of jobs at season’s end if he can continue to win the way that he’s won up to this point.”

There’s another coach not too far down the road who could also earn consideration after he helped lead his team to back-to-back College Football Playoff appearances.

“Another one that might be in consideration is Sherrone Moore,” McElroy said. “He’s 37 years old. He was at Central Michigan for a little while and then went to Michigan in 2018 and has now become the OC. He’s put together an incredible offensive line contingent there, in winning the Joe Moore Award back-to-back years the last couple years.”

In the event that Michigan State wants to go after someone with a little more experience coming off the Tucker disaster, there are also a handful of good options.

Some have already been scouted and courted by the Spartans in the past.

“Another guy to potentially consider would be Pat Narduzzi,” McElroy said. “Pat Narduzzi, the last time this job was made available, was certainly in contention. I believe there’s reports out there that he turned it down not once but twice, and then he decided to remain loyal at the time to Pitt.

“But right now Pitt is sitting at 1-2 and things don’t look quite as good for Pitt in the near future with what’s going on in the ACC and what Phil Jurkovec has done to this point. So maybe in the event in which Pitt doesn’t look quite as good, maybe Narduzzi really considers making this move if it’s afforded to him this time around.”

If Michigan State’s looking for someone with a little more recent success than that, a Colorado name could enter the mix.

“Another name to keep in mind is Sean Lewis, formerly the head coach of Kent State, currently the offensive coordinator of Colorado,” McElroy said. “Has a ton of Midwest ties, runs an innovative offense that really features playmakers, wide receivers and quarterback play. And clearly with the disadvantage that they have at Colorado with the offensive line, they can kind of coach around that with the scheme that they run. Now the results were a little bit mixed at Kent State, but he did, it’s a tough place to win, he won more games than a lot of people there, at least in the last handful of years prior to taking the OC job at Colorado.”

McElroy contributed one other name to the discussion for the Spartans.

“Then finally another name that I think will continue to probably get evaluated, kicked around every once in a while, will be Willie Fritz at Tulane,” McElroy said. “Obviously last year he was 12-2 and there were a lot of people that thought maybe he’d get a job this past year. Well, they brought back a decent amount of that team and this was a group that had two wins two years ago, so he’s a good coach that’s universally respected. So maybe he gets some calls this offseason as well, and maybe one of those calls from East Lansing.”

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