Jaguars’ Urban Meyer: ‘No chance’ of leaving Jacksonville to coach USC

USC let go of head coach Clay Helton on Monday afternoon just two games into the 2021 college football season. At the time, the school said they were searching for a “change in leadership” to fill one of the most desired jobs in college football.

However, Urban Meyer won’t be in the running for that position. The first-year Jaguars’ coach confirmed that he had no interest in leaving Jacksonville to return to the college game.

“No chance,” Meyer told reporters of joining USC. “I’m committed to here and building an organization.”

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Things have gotten off to a rocky start during Meyer’s Jaguars tenure. A Jason La Canfora report ahead of Week 1 indicated that Meyer’s “unhinged” style was having a negative impact on his relationship with his players.

“He has everyone looking over their shoulders already,” a source told CBS. “He becomes unhinged way too easily, and he doesn’t know how to handle losing, even in the preseason. He loses it and wants to take over the drills himself. It’s not good.”

Certainly, Week 1 wasn’t good for the Jaguars. They were blown out by the Texans, 37-21. Houston is widely considered to be one of the worst teams in the NFL, so losing in that fashion was humiliating for Meyer and Co.

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Meyer won national championships at Ohio State and Florida, and had an undefeated season at Utah. He is third all-time among Division 1 coaches in winning percentage with a minimum of 100 games, traling only Notre Dame’s Knute Rockne and Frank Leahy. That’s why there has been increased speculation that he could be one of the candidates for the USC job. That doesn’t seem likely after Meyer’s comments on Wednesday, but you can never rule anything out.

After all, Nick Saban and Bobby Petrino left the Dolphins and Falcons respectively to take SEC jobs at Alabama and Arkansas. Neither coach indicated that they were considering leaving their posts before their moves.

Of course, Meyer has been with the Jaguars for less than one year, so he may want to see this thing out. When he joined Jacksonville, he acknowledged that he was excited about the team’s future.

“I’m excited about the future of this organization and our long term prospect for success,” Meyer wrote in a statement.

GREER: Jaguars players ‘aren’t thrilled’ with Urban Meyer’s coaching style

So, it looks like he’s staying for now. Nonetheless, this will be a situation to watch moving forward. Because if Meyer continues to have trouble adapting to the NFL, that could make him consider abandoning ship.