Kyle Flood Receives Extension

Rutgers Director of Athletics (DOA) Julie Hermann has extended head football coach Kyle Flood's contract through the 2018 season, the school announced today. Flood's deal was set to expire after the 2016 season, and he will receive a slight raise and more money to spend on assistant coaches as part of this deal. His buy out will also increase from $700K to $1.4 million.

The timing of this is very curious, as it was widely reported that Hermann tried to fire Flood after last season, but could not raise the funds necessary to pay his buy out. I'm not sure how a 2-0 start with one of the wins coming against an FCS team changes anything, but then again Hermann is not the right person to lead Rutgers' athletics department and we already knew that. At minimum, extension talks should have waited until after this season. There has also been some speculation that super booster Dave Brown was pulling the strings on this deal-- which has supposedly been in the works since June when Flood hired Jimmy Sexton as his agent-- which only undermines Hermann.

I can't say I'm thrilled about Flood receiving an extension. Flood has gone to two bowl games and shared a conference championship in his two seasons as head coach, but he inherited a full cupboard from Greg Schiano and he himself has done nothing to prove he is the right man to lead Rutgers going forward. The team has collapsed down the stretch in both of his seasons at the helm, including three blow out losses and a loss to a dreadful UConn team in conference play a year ago, and that's not even mentioning what he's done recruiting wise. Flood has alienated seemingly every high school coach and player in New Jersey by revoking the scholarship offers of multiple committed recruits who visited elsewhere. Things were looking very bleak as recently as a month ago, and I'm not sure what has changed between then and now.

This move could set Rutgers back quite a few years if things do not change, but one of the few bright spots of this move is it could help recruiting a little bit moving forward. Flood's job security has supposedly been one of the obstacles the program has faced on the recruiting trail, and this will at least quell those qualms. Rutgers has a HUGE batch of recruits visiting this weekend for the showdown with Penn State (including the #1 2016 recruit in the nation according to 247 Kareem Walker), so maybe that explains the timing.

Flood is a really good guy and I truly hope he succeeds, but he certainly has to improve quite a bit to justify this extension. Moves like hiring Ralph Friedgen are a step in the right direction on the field, and maybe improved play and more job security will result in better results recruiting wise. How this extension works out will probably define Hermann's tenure as athletic director, regardless of whether or not she had anything to do with it.