Todd Haley, Kevin Sumlin, Mike Riley, Bart Andrus named head coaches in USFL

5:00 PM

The USFL announced the hiring of its first four head coaches on Thursday, with play scheduled to start this spring.

The league will have eight teams, with 10-game regular-season schedules running from April 16 through June.

The USFL hit the 100 day mark today, and president Brian Woods said it was a monumental day. The quality of the league we're building speaks to that, and we were able to attract two former NFL head coaches, Mike Riley and Todd Haley, as well as Bart Andrus, a former head coach in NFL Europe and the Canadian Football League, to the USFL.

They all share the same belief in high-quality spring football, and we're honored to have them lead their respective teams this year. We can't wait to hit the field!

Haley was the head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs. He worked for the Chiefs from 2009 to 2011. He was fired as the Cleveland Browns' offensive coach in the fall of 2018, but has since been working as an offensive coach.

The USFL's Gamblers will be coached by Sumlin. The former University of Houston coach had stops at Texas A&M and Arizona.

The New Jersey Generals have hired Riley, the former head coach of the Bolts. Riley has had coaching stops at Oregon State and Nebraska, as well as professional jobs with the AAF and XFL.

The Philadelphia Stars will be led by Andrus, who coached in the Canadian Football League, the UFL and the NFL Europe.

The league said the remaining four head coaches would be announced at a later date.

The USFL crumbled after three seasons because of overspending and a push by Donald Trump to compete against the NFL in a fall season.

In the end, the USFL's most enduring legacy was the $3 judgment it won in an antitrust suit against the NFL, a ruling that finished off the league in 1986 before it carried out the Trump-backed move from spring to fall.

NBC is the league's official broadcast partner and Fox Sports has a minority equity stake in the company that owns the new USFL.

Training camps will open March 21 and a player selection meeting will be held in February. Each team will have a practice squad.

The Associated Press contributed to the report.