Justin Wilcox was mentioned as a logical candidate for the Oregon job once Willie Taggart left for Florida State, but one report says he was not interested in leaving his job at Cal to take over the Ducks.
Wilcox, 41, is from Eugene and played football at Oregon, so he made a lot of sense as a possible candidate. He is young, has had success as a defensive coordinator at multiple top programs, and he has been a coach at three different Pac-12 schools. But he just completed his first season as Cal’s head coach and has work to do there before leaving.
RE: the #Oregon HC hire.. Justin Wilcox was not a candidate in the mix for the vacancy and never met with Oregon search people for the job, sources tell me. He is happy at #Cal and was not interested in leaving.
— Bruce Feldman (@BruceFeldmanCFB) December 8, 2017
The Ducks on Friday decided to announce that Mario Cristobal is the program’s new head coach. Cristobal, who was the offensive coordinator under Taggart, was named the interim head coach earlier this week, and then that tag was lifted.
Cristobal, 47, was previously a long-time head coach at FIU and took them to two bowl games before surprisingly being fired. He spent time as an assistant on Nick Saban’s staff at Alabama before joining Taggart at Oregon. And now he’s back to being a head coach.
