Urban Meyer may not be coaching anymore, but he is still making things happen in college football.
The former Ohio State coach was credited as instrumental to Bowling Green’s hire of Eddie George as the school’s new head coach. Both the school and George himself said Meyer had essentially introduced the two sides and facilitated the hire.
Bowling Green athletic director Derek van der Merwe said Monday that he had reached out to Meyer seeking the coach’s input on the school’s hiring process, and that Meyer had only given George’s name.
“After talking to Urban Meyer, he called me the next day, and he says, ‘I only have one name for you.'” I said, ‘Give me names. Please give me as many names as you can.’ He said, ‘I have one name for you. I want you to talk to Eddie George,'” van der Merwe said, via Dan Hope of Eleven Warriors. “I said, ‘the Heisman Trophy winner, right?’ He says yeah. He says, ‘Don’t look at anything. Don’t read anything on him. Don’t read his background. Talk to him. Talk to the human being.'”
Similarly, George recalled that Meyer had talked up the Bowling Green job to him.
Meyer was uniquely positioned to aid in the search. He got his first head coaching job at Bowling Green in 2001, and he and George both have long-standing ties to Ohio State. Essentially, he put the entire hire together on his own.
Bowling Green officially announced George’s hire on Monday. The former Heisman Trophy winner replaced Scot Loeffler, who left to become the new quarterback coach for the Philadelphia Eagles.
