First off, no one knows anything, except maybe Brandow who has the Jerry Glanville hotline on speed dial. Everyone else is just speculating, but the rumors are abound that Paul Johnson and Jimbo Fisher are to interview this week for the Wolfpack job. Johnson today and Jimbo later in the week.

Secondly, I would like to say, I am glad that I don’t have to make this decision there are too many positives for all these candidates but also negatives.

Here is a quick summary off the top of my head.

Paul Johnson – Proven winner but can that offense win in a BCS conference? and can he recruit in the ACC with that offense?

Jimbo Fisher – Great offensive mind and recruiter but can he be successful as a head coach?

Jim Donnan – Consistent winner at Marshall and UGA, Offensive mind, but has he been out of the game too long?

Steve Logan – Probably the best evaluator of local talent, would bring in some big time assistants, but can he get it done in Raleigh an do we want a coach ECU fired, albeit, idiotically fired?

Norm Chow – Great offensive mind and quarterback developer but why at the age of 60, has he not had a head coaching job before? (I believe NCSU and ASU are second in line to the newly opened Stanford job)

Jerry Glanville – according to Brent, “as long as here wears all black and a cowboy hat, there are no negatives”

David Cutcliffe – for the record, I am firmly against this one, best record with Eli Manning was 7-4, sound familiar?

Dick Sheridan – One of the best coaches in NC State history, but are the 13 years he has been out of the game, too much?

The real question to me is, Who Would bring in the best staff?

Its not just about the Coach, its about the staff they will bring in as well. We all saw the nasty staff Chuck had brought in early with Buddy Green, Doc Holliday, Reggie Herring, Norm Chow among others but when he lost his quality assistants, the team lost.

Maybe its just me but it seems that Jimbo Fisher and Steve Logan would bring in the best staffs. Rumors are abound that Jimbo Fisher’s good friend is the Auburn DC who Jimbo would bring with him to Raleigh, if this were true than I’m pretty sure any NC State fan would jump at the chance to hire Fisher.

I’ve become an avid Steve Logan radio show fan, he is very entertaining and without a doubt in my mind knows his stuff. Everyday he seems to drop names as to people he knows which got me thinking maybe he could really assemble a stellar staff. Among these connections, TE coach of the Broncos, NFL Europe coaches with NC ties, and Logan has friends currently on the lame duck Miami staff which happen to be unhappy with the rumors that Mike Leach of Texas Tech is going to be the new head coach at the U. Is NC State the “right fit” for Logan, who has said he would get back into the college game if the right job was there for him, I’m not sure but I think he should seriously be considered.

Scooter and I were talking yesterday about the coaching search and how important it is to be able to recruit in NC. If you look back at successful Wolfpack players in recent history a bulk of them have come from NC. Mario Williams, Manny Lawson, TA, the Holts, Tony Baker, Andre Brown, Leroy Harris, etc. Every year there are about 8 to 10 impact players coming out of North Carolina that can be impact guys in major college football and if you include the talent rich Tidewater area of VA that number at least doubles. Now if a coach at NC State that was able to land about 4-6 of these players each year, he would do very well for himself and the program.

There is plenty of talent every year coming out of North Carolina/VA for NC State and UNC (and others) to all be able to recruit talent, the job of these universities is to KEEP THE TALENT IN STATE. There is no reason to take the leftovers from Florida when we have top talent here in the state. Logan has proved time and time again to be able to recruit the State of NC and develop big time quarterbacks (Blake, Garrard, Pinkney and another name I’m forgetting.) which makes him very attractive in my opinion.

Scooter also had the bright idea that no matter who is the next coach at NC State, that person would be best served to hire former State great Anthony Barbour and also find one of the most successful high school coaches in NC and hire that person as well in order to solidify a solid pipeline to some of the talent rich programs of NC.

Without doing any research and know anything about the type of staff the other guys would bring in, Fisher and Logan look mighty attractive to me and would take the first step to winning on the field would be Winning in North Carolina.