2/14: Gene Chizik on walking away from coaching & the crazy world of college recruiting
The Audible with Stew, Bruce & Ralph: A show about college football
The Athletic
4.4 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 14 February 2017
⏱️ 60 minutes
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Summary
Bruce and Stew are joined by former Auburn head coach and UNC defensive coordinator Gene Chizik, who explains his difficult decision to walk away from coaching to spend more time with his family. He shares the different reactions he received from colleagues and friends when he announced his decision to step down (11:00); Thoughts on UNC quarterback Mitch Trubisky, who is expected to be one of the first QBs taken in this year’s draft. (22:00); What it was like to coach against Clemson QB DeShaun Watson (26:00);
The guys discuss the NFL Combine invite list, and the Big 12’s lack of representation (34:00); Bruce talks about his look inside Ed Orgeron’s war room at LSU on the road to signing day (46:00); and the crazy world of college football recruiting.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Audible. |
| 0:10.4 | I'm Stuart Mandel, joined by Bruce Feldman. |
| 0:13.3 | And Bruce, thank you for lining up a what I think should be a very interesting guest. |
| 0:20.0 | Yeah, you know, it's funny. |
| 0:21.5 | You see things through a different prism now as when you become a parent. |
| 0:25.4 | And I think the story that happened in college football last, we kind of resonated with us |
| 0:31.1 | maybe in a different way than it would have a couple of years ago. |
| 0:35.2 | And you're talking, of course, about Gene Chiswick, the former Auburn Head Coach, who's been North Carolina's defensive coordinator of the past two seasons, stepping down to spend more time with his family. That's something that I feel like when you've heard that about somebody say that in the past, it would get mocked or you just wouldn't believe it or they'd say that and they'd be |
| 0:54.9 | right back to work. But as you're going to hear in this interview, no, this really is about him, |
| 1:00.2 | you know, looking at the bigger picture, realizing that he doesn't, his family's back in Auburn. |
| 1:05.4 | He doesn't want to continue this when his son's about to start high school. And so he is leaving |
| 1:09.5 | coaching. And so we have a very interesting conversation. |
| 1:13.4 | It gets a little bit deeper than your typical podcast interview with a college football coach. |
| 1:17.1 | So I hope you enjoy it. |
| 1:18.4 | All right. |
| 1:18.8 | And Stu, we are pleased to be joined by our guest today, Gene Chiswick. |
| 1:23.0 | He is, as we reported last week, stepping down as the defensive coordinator at North Carolina and had a pretty good reason for it. And we're going to get into that now. Coach, thanks for joining us on the Audible today. Hey, guys. Glad to be here with you. And it's a beautiful day out. And I just appreciate you having me all. All right. So let's start start with this I think for some people it was a |
| 1:44.9 | little bit of surprise you guys have you know you've been there a couple of years and you had |
| 1:49.0 | you know made a big difference with the defense uh but when people found out the reasoning |
| 1:54.9 | just basically to go back home your family had still been living living in Auburn where you had coached before |
| 2:02.1 | and not to reconnect with them, but just to get a chance to be more a part of their lives. |
| 2:08.2 | How much had this been weighing on you since you've been up in Chapel Hill? |
... |
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