Turner Gill will be formally introduced as coach of Kansas on Monday, but there's already a site calling for his ouster.
Fire Turner Gill started making the rounds Sunday, only hours after reports surfaced of Kansas' decision to hire the 47-year-old coach from Buffalo.
The site was registered Oct. 8 and lists an address of Athens, Ga., according to domain records. The administrator goes by the initials H K.
H K replied to an email but did not answer if the site was simply an angry reaction to the "resignation" of Mark Mangino.
Instead, they sent the following statement: "Let me first say that I believe Turner Gill is an outstanding human being, but my website is directed towards the lack of a national coaching search that all Kansas Jayhawk fans deserved.
"No fanbase should stand for mediocrity, and mediocrity is exactly what this hire was. I won't say I was opposed to the Mangino firing, because (honestly) I don't know exactly what went on. However, I do oppose the way he was treated at the end of his tenure."
Here are a couple of other screen grabs from the site.
Let's get real here, Jayhawk fans. Kansas remains a basketball school and it's not a destination point for football coaches. Running Mangino was a mistake and given the circumstances, you're fortunate to have Turner Gill. Houston Nutt and Jim Harbaugh never had any intention of becoming Jayhawk coach. They merely used the opening as leverage with their current employers.
Consider what you have in Gill, who made something out of nothing at Buffalo. He has a Big 12 background and recruiting connections in Texas. It could be worse, much worse.
These "fire X coach" websites stopped being interesting stories several years ago.
Posted by: chris | December 14, 2009 at 02:01 AM
HK is a liar and a POS...
This link is to Google's cached version of HK's site, relating to Buffalo:
http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:vG8rnyqOL-o...
Posted by: Do your homework... | December 14, 2009 at 08:30 AM
don't know why the cache link isn't working. trying again:
http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:vG8rnyqOL-oJ:fireturnergill.com/Why_Fire_Turner_.html+http://www.fireturnergill.com/FireTurnerGill.html&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Posted by: Do your homework... | December 14, 2009 at 08:40 AM
That H.K. guy is absolutely correct. As a Jayhawk fan, I cannot believe more research was not conducted before settling for a mediocre coach such as Turner Gill. The man didn't even have a .500 winning percentage. What a joke.
Posted by: Concerned | December 14, 2009 at 11:02 AM
They should have gone after sumlin at UH. He is waiting for a major conference job to jump to (not Cinn).
You missed the boat on a good one.
Posted by: JRG | December 14, 2009 at 12:21 PM
I don't think win loss records at Buffalo are good indicators of how well a job he's done there. It's the bottom of the barrel in college football -- so, any improvement would be a monumental accomplishment. Gill has done that.
Posted by: Mike D. | December 14, 2009 at 12:32 PM
Sheesh, Kansas fans. Isn't there a basketball game on or something? If you really think you can do better than Turner Gill you are kidding yourselves. Kevin Sumlin? If he turned down Cincinnati he's clearly looking for something better - and coaching at a basketball school in the middle of nowhere isn't it.
Besides, Gill is in it for the long haul and that's exactly what you need right now. Anyone else on your dream list would have just used it as a stepping stone. Because that's all Kansas is right now.
Posted by: J.Pike | December 14, 2009 at 08:23 PM