Karsceal Turner – I Got NEXT!
After four conference titles and recent domination in the Florida Classic series against Florida A&M, Bethune-Cookman football head coach Brian Jenkins is taking his coaching prowess 458 miles from the tropics of Central Florida into the Heart of Dixie, specifically Montgomery, Alabama, home of the Alabama State University Hornets. He replaces Reggie Barlow, who was 49-42 in eight seasons leading the program and is the 26th head football coach at ASU.
In his five years as a head coach at B-CU, Jenkins won or tied for four Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) titles, earned three FCS playoff berths and two HBCU national titles. B-CU won at least eight games each season, including a pair of 10-win seasons, and never finished below second place in the conference standings in posting a 34-6 record in MEAC contests, including a perfect 8-0 mark in 2012. The Wildcats also won 18 straight conference games between 2011-13, the second-longest streak in league history.
A three-time conference coach of the year, Jenkins’ teams also defeated arch-rival Florida A&M four straight seasons (2011-14) for the first time in school history.
B-CU President Dr. Edison O. Jackson expressed gratitude for Jenkins achievements during his Wildcat tenure.
“We are so appreciative of the impact that Brian Jenkins had on our university and community through his leadership of our football program, and the five years that he was here will go down as an exciting and successful era to be celebrated,” said Dr. Edison O. Jackson, President of Bethune-Cookman University.” I have full confidence that our director of athletics, Lynn W. Thompson, and his staff will identify the next head coach to take us to even higher plateaus.”
The search for a new head coach has already begun, according to B-CU’s Thompson, and a decision about the future of the program could be made within the next few days.
“We intend to continue to excel in recruiting and to capitalize on the momentum of winning three consecutive MEAC crowns. Our next head coach will accept these expectations and implement a plan to surpass those accomplishments,” Thompson expressed.
Thus far, the paring down to replace the highly successful coach has yielded three candidates, “and a possible”, for my spades playing readers.
Tis the season for coaching changes
Methinks you already recall the firing of Florida coach Will Muschamp last month. The University of Florida announced Muschamp would coach Florida’s final two games of the regular season and then step down from the position. And so it goes in the world of collegiate football. Bethune-Cookman joins FAMU in the search for a new head coach. The Rattlers fired coach Earl Holmes during the past season. The school’s search committee has narrowed its pool of candidates to eight finalists and interim athletic director Nelson Townsend suggested a new coach could be named “any day now.”
Jenkins, 34 was eager to hit the ground running in Dixie’s birthplace. “When you walk around town and get greeted by genuine people who enjoy each other, when you have leadership like you have here, when you have the facilities that you have, when you still have the potential for growth, when you have people who have a vision and have determination and who are never satisfied and want more, that should intrigue you enough and because of that it is a major attraction to me.”
Jenkins said he is looking to put a staff together over the next few days and to hit the recruiting trail.
“Alabama is a powerhouse football state and a lot of people don’t know that,” Jenkins said. “People say Florida, California, Texas, but they don’t come to Alabama like they should. If we recruit 100 miles north, south east and west, we can attract enough players to build a program. I have some work to do, I’m unfamiliar with the territory of Alabama, but I’m not unfamiliar with recruiting.”
ASU campus welcome coach with open arms and high expectations
During this entire process the name of Brian Jenkins is the one that continued to come up,” Interim Athletic Director Melvin Hines said. “Everywhere I turned everyone I talked to, everyone kept mentioning Brian Jenkins.”
You wonder why?
Wildcat faithful are perhaps scratching their heads at Jenkins decision. Allow me to throw four quick-pitch incentives atcha.
One. They have a stadium on campus. Let’s begin with that new ASU Stadium 26,5000-seat stadium on the campus of Alabama State University as the host venue for the Alabama State Hornets football team. The stadium also holds a restaurant and retail space which welcome visitors to the stadium and area 365 days a year. The stadium itself will be used year-round with other events such as concerts and band competitions.
By contrast, Municipal Stadium, is a 9,601-seat multi-purpose stadium in Daytona Beach, Florida, is home to the Bethune-Cookman University Wildcat football team, is also used to host home games for the Mainland High School football team. The stadium is also known as Larry Kelly Field. Municipal Stadium took a huge step in becoming a fully modern football facility, when a video board that is nearly 36 feet wide and 16 feet tall was unveiled a few weeks ago.
Two. Jenkins earned a salary of $265,000 per year at B-CU, according to the Daytona News-Journal. Alabama State has been coping with budget problems, but school leaders targeted Jenkins early in the coaching search and Alabama State trustee chairman Locy Baker told the Montgomery Advertiser “we’ve had some alumni step up to the plate and make a difference.” I got no numbers on Jenkins’ ASU salary but I know money talks and B.S. runs the marathon.
Three. Let us delve into the hassles avoided because the SWAC is one of two conferences – the other being the Ivy League – that does not participate in the FCS football playoffs, and is the only one of the two whose members offer a full complement of scholarships for football. The SWAC instead splits its schools into two divisions, and plays a conference championship game. You’ll recall that Brian Jenkins is an “adrenaline junkie,” (I say this respectfully). This is the same guy who participated in his first (and what he says will be his only) MMA bout in June, taking on a 27-year-old opponent in a “Breakthrough MMA” event in Deland, Fla. Jenkins lost the bout through disqualification. Jenkins dropped his opponent with a series of punches, but was disqualified by the judges for continuing to punch him while grounded — punches that are legal in professional MMA, but not in amateur matches between fighters with less than three bouts of experience. Regardless, Jenkins sent a message to his players, and coaches. “I wanted to prove to my players that everything I ask them to do as far as focus and attention to detail … that is what I put into preparing for this fight, and I went out and executed.
Four. Jenkins, a Fort Lauderdale native, Florida touches Alabama, and he isn’t too far from his Lauderdale roots. Also, Jenkins was equally proud of the work his team did off the field. He supported a variety of academic and life skills programs for his athletes, urging them to be leaders on and off the field.
Add these ingredients together and bam! just like that, Jenkins goes from being a ferocious Wildcat to stirring up a Hornet’s Nest.
Here’s Jenkins final take before beginning the transformation to “head Hornet”
“I think the number one thing we need to do is sell ASU to Alabama. If we can do that in the right manner, I think we will be successful. So I’m going to put our ground roots of recruiting in the state of Alabama.”
Jenkins first official day at Alabama State will be January 1. …and still I scream Hail Wildcats!
