Texas Football: Finebaum thinks it’s too little too late for Tom Herman

The Texas football coaching search hasn’t gone great so far, with no conclusive results. But Paul Finebaum threw in an interesting take concerning Herman.

Considering Texas football is coming off a solid win, by the dominant final score of 69-31 over the Kansas State Wildcats and head coach Chris Klieman from last weekend, fourth-year head coach Tom Herman does not find himself in an admirable position. Herman has led Texas to a record of 6-3 (5-3 Big 12) following their 38-point dismantling of Kansas State over the weekend.

What has eluded Herman in his tenure as the Longhorns head coach is both consistent results on the field and on the recruiting trail. Herman mostly recruited well until the latter portion of the 2021 cycle, and for the foundation of the 2022 class. Definitely the most detrimental event on the recruiting trail since Herman took over as Texas head coach was losing the commitment back on Oct. 28 of the elite five-star Southlake Carroll pro-style quarterback Quinn Ewers.

Texas wound up seeing the commitment of Ewers essentially flip from them to head coach Ryan Day and the Ohio State Buckeyes. Losing elite in-state talent to the Buckeyes is something that Herman and the Longhorns got accustomed to of late.

That’s not something that Texas fans want to see become an overall trend in the next few cycles. This is also why the Longhorns were pursuing the former Ohio State and Florida Gators three-time National Championship winning head coach Urban Meyer in recent weeks. That didn’t work out in their favor, but a coaching search might extend into next offseason.

One big time voice around the college football media landscape, Paul Finebaum, gave his take on the Herman hot seat situation this week. Finebaum makes the argument that since the Texas administration is already publicly announcing some sort of coaching search with the Meyer pursuit that transpired that it already “may be too late for Herman”.

Here’s more on what Finebaum had to say on the matter (monologue thanks to 247Sports).

"“I think it’s a matter of who they can get,” Finebaum said on WJOX. “All these people, all these boosters and I would include the athletic director there running around the country, it doesn’t exactly help your recruiting when you’re interviewing other coaches while your coach is out there competing. So it may be too late for Tom Herman.”"

This does bring up the interesting point of who the Longhorns could go after on the recruiting trail that would make all of this noise surrounding the coaching situation worth it heading into the offseason. With the Meyer pursuit appearing to be all but over, the choices become much more narrowed down.

There’s no clear winning option in this regard as it stands now. That is unless a huge name, like a Nick Saban or Dabo Swinney, expressed interest in this coaching job. And the likelihood of either of those expressing interest in Texas is extraordinarily improbable.

Often times Finebaum just seems like he likes to wreak havoc on the Big 12, especially with the Longhorns. But he brings up a very valid point here that Texas should tactically proceed with how they pursue this coaching search in the public eye in the near future. If they’re not careful, the results for Herman on the recruiting trail could get worse moving forward.