Kirk Ferentz describes approach to finding next offensive coordinator, which will continue into January 2024

IOWA CITY — Iowa football's offensive coordinator vacancy will stay vacant for at least another two weeks.

Head coach Kirk Ferentz told reporters Monday his decision on Iowa’s next offensive coordinator will happen “sometime in January for sure.”

“There won’t be a decision before the bowl,” Ferentz said. “I can pretty much assure you of that.”

Ferentz has made “three phone calls so far” regarding the search and will “hopefully get one more in this week.”

Ferentz, when asked specifically about former Wisconsin head coach Paul Chryst, said he has “always had tremendous respect for Paul.”

“He did an outstanding job at Wisconsin,” Ferentz said. “He really did a great job. … That’s a program that we’ve really aspired to try to compete with.”

Asked specifically about Joe Philbin — the former Iowa offensive line coach who later had NFL coaching stints with the Miami Dolphins and Green Bay Packers — Ferentz said he has “great respect for Joe, too.”

“He was a tremendous coach here,” Ferentz said. “We caught a lot of crap for hiring him out of Harvard. I think it was it would have been good if it was a junior high quiz, but not for football. But he did an excellent job here. He was an excellent coach with Green Bay. … Great person, great football coach. No question about that.”

As Ferentz evaluates candidates, he underscored the importance of his assistant coaches being “good teachers.”

"Our first job is to be mentors — to show our guys how to act, how to do things,“ Ferentz said. ”Handling bad situations is a big part of it, and you got to be a good teacher. And you got to be a football guy, too, but what we do is not nuclear science.“

Regardless of who Iowa’s next offensive coordinator is, a major schematic overhaul does not seem to be in order.

“We’re not going to become a run-and-shoot (offense),” Ferentz said. “Mouse Davis isn’t coming, no. Or June Jones.”

That being said, Ferentz used the analogy of Norm Parker’s latitude to do what he needed as defensive coordinator from 1999-2011 to describe the latitude Iowa’s next offensive coordinator will have to “design the A, B, Cs, all that stuff.”

“I wasn’t hung up on a three-man front, a four-man front, not locked into that or fixated on that,” Ferentz said. “But to play defense, you got to play blocks, no matter what front you’re in. You got to run to the football in a smart way. You got to be able to be able to tackle. You can’t give up big plays.”

The next offensive coordinator will be taking over an offense that ranks dead-last among the 130 non-reclassifying FBS teams in yards per game and yards per play.

Ferentz’s “first and foremost thoughts” have been on the 2023 Hawkeyes ahead of the Citrus Bowl.

“They remain that way through New Year’s,” Ferentz said. “We have an opportunity right now. I think we’d be one of five teams to win more than 10 games here in the history of the program. That’s pretty significant. So for me to not be focused on that first and foremost would really be negligent of my duties.”

He also has been “flying by the seat of my pants” with other end-of-season tasks, including “recruiting our own guys” who have the ability to go pro. (Linebacker Jay Higgins and defensive backs Cooper DeJean and Sebastian Castro all said on Monday they have not decided their 2024 plans yet.)

As Ferentz focuses on the bowl game, Brian Ferentz — the soon-exiting offensive coordinator and Kirk’s eldest son — has “got to worry about himself” and his coaching future.

“That’s probably first and foremost on his mind,” Kirk Ferentz said.

Kirk Ferentz said Brian is “intending” to coach the Citrus Bowl, but that could change.

“If he gets a job tomorrow, I don’t expect him to be here,” Kirk Ferentz said. “If he is, I may have to visit with him about that.”

The team will leave Iowa City for Orlando on Dec. 26 to prepare for the Jan. 1 Citrus Bowl. Kirk Ferentz will “really turn our attention” to the offensive coordinator search after the team returns to Iowa as he conducts “some face-to-face meetings and those kinds of things.”

“As I stand here right now, I feel total confidence that we’ll have a really good person here,” Ferentz said. “I think there’s some strong interest from people that would make a lot of sense, that really fit, and I think fit what we need.”

Comments: john.steppe@thegazette.com