According to sources, Bobby Petrino, one of the best offensive minds in the game, is going to be UNLV's offensive coach.
The head coach at Missouri State has been there for three years. The Bears made the playoffs in both of his seasons. Missouri State hadn't played in the playoffs in twenty years.
This will be the first assistant-coaching job for Petrino in a decade. This will be his 18th coaching job and he has been promoted a couple of times.
In previous stops, the 61-year-old has been wildly successful. He elevated Arkansas and Louisville to national relevancy for the first time in years, and has won more games as a college head coach than any other coach.
He was fired from Arkansas in April 2012 after school officials said he lied about a motorcycle accident while riding with a woman he was having an affair with. The Razorbacks won 11 games and finished fifth in the final AP poll. They played in the Sugar Bowl, winning 10 games.
"Unfortunately, I will always carry that with me, how it ended there," he said. I let a lot of people down by hurting them.
The Atlanta Falcons were criticized by their coaches and players for allowing Bobby Petrino to leave to take the Arkansas job. At the time of Petrino's departure, the Falcons were 3-7.
There were two different head-coaching jobs at Louisville. He took the Falcons' job after agreeing to a new deal at Louisville, after leading the Cards to a pair of top 10 finishes. He was out of coaching for a year in 2012 after being fired at Arkansas and then at Western Kentucky, before coming back to Louisville.
His second stint at Louisville was filled with victories. The team went 21-11 in league games and won nine games twice in four years, but it all fell apart in the last year. The Cards lost their last nine games after the death of Petrino's father. The coach was dismissed with two games left in the season. After being hired at Missouri State, he was out of football for a year.
Some of the best coaches in the country praise Petrino's penchant for calling a game on offense.
"Coaching against him, the things they do on offense, the way his players are coached, it's incredible," Alabama's Nick Saban said. He is one of the toughest people I have faced.
The new Louisville coach said that he could take a group of college students on a team and help them win games.
He talked to other schools about openings and had discussions with Texas A&M's Jimbo Fisher about the offense.
The challenge of rebuilding the UNLV program, which has suffered through nine losing seasons, was something that appealed to Petrino. There is a flight from Las Vegas to Montana.
The deal is expected to be announced soon when Petrino arrives in Las Vegas.
Ryan Beard is the son-in-law of Petrino and will be the next Missouri State head coach. The Bears have a defensive coach.
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