Texas Football: Former HC Charlie Strong under NCAA inquiry

Former Texas football head coach Charlie Strong is reportedly under NCAA inquiry for what happened during his tenure with USF.

Over the course of a three year head coaching tenure from 2014-2016 with the Texas football program, Charlie Strong left plenty of unsettled feelings and not a whole lot of success on the win column. Texas only got bowl eligible on one occasion under Strong’s wing, and that came in his first season at the helm.

In that one bowl game that the Longhorns made during his tenure on the Forty Acres, Strong fell short to the Arkansas Razorbacks in a convincing loss in the Texas Bowl. The other two seasons that the Longhorns had Strong at the helm, he would finish up with five wins and miss the postseason. Texas didn’t get back to the postseason until current head coach Tom Herman took over prior to the start of the 2017 season.

After his run as Texas head coach ended, Strong was brought aboard in the same position with the South Florida Bulls. During the 2017 offseason, USF had lost their former head coach Willie Taggart to the Oregon Ducks (he later ended up with the Florida State Seminoles, and was bought out there too), and Strong was hired to replace him.

Strong was taking over a pretty solid Group of Five program at USF, at least at the time. And he seemingly started off on the right foot too. USF finished in the top 25 during the 2017 season, with a double-digit win record.

However, Strong had a long road down to the bottom, where he was let go as USF head coach. He went from winning 10 games in 2017, to seven in 2018, and just four last season. He was let go entering the 2020 offseason.

Now there’s even more controversy surrounding Strong’s tenure as USF head coach. According to a report from Joey Knight of the Tampa Bay Times, Strong is now the “subject of an ongoing inquiry” into the USF football program.

Here’s more on what that piece from the Tampa Bay Times had to say on the matter.

"“The University of South Florida acknowledges that the NCAA enforcement staff is currently conducting an inquiry to determine whether violations of NCAA legislation occurred with the university’s athletics program,” Kelly said.“The university is working cooperatively with the NCAA enforcement staff and will continue to do so. In order to protect the integrity of the investigation, the university will provide no details or make further comment at this time.”"

This news regarding Strong and the USF program matters to the Longhorns in two particular areas. One is that Strong is the most recent head coach of Texas prior to Herman’s regime taking over. And the other is that USF is the team that the Longhorns are supposed to open the 2020 season up against come Sep. 5.

There was also a report from The Football Scoop earlier in the week that Strong knowingly allowed “analysts or quality control personnel to conduct impermissible hands-on coaching”.

While this is not a formal investigation as of yet, it is something noteworthy to continue watching as the 2020 offseason moves along. It is certainly noteworthy just given all the emphasis that the NCAA is focusing on investigations into various big hoops and football programs this year.

Texas registered a record of 16-21 in the three years under Strong’s direction. He registered a career head coaching record in the FBS of 74-53 after his run with USF ended entering the offseason. His most successful years as a head coach to date came with the Louisville Cardinals from 2010-2013.