Gamecocks hire Will Muschamp: Convincing myself he's the right man for the job

Let's be honest, if you go 28-21 in a four-year stretch as the head football coach at the University of South Carolina, you'll probably be around for a fifth. If you lead a top-10 defense in three out of four years as a Gamecock coach, you'll probably keep your job. If you recruit top five classes in three out of four years, Ray Tanner probably gives you a raise.

If you do that as the head football coach at the majority of FBS schools, there may be some pressure, but there's also patience as well. Will Muschamp did all of that at the University of Florida, where the expectation is no longer bowl games, but championships, and was fired. That's almost the case at South Carolina.

Gamecocks AD Ray Tanner dropped a number of stats up at the podium Monday morning to convince everyone in the room that Will Muschamp is the right man to lead the university's football program. All of them were relevant to our void at head coach. And, all of them are supposed to lead to victories on the field.

Will Muschamp's the right man to lead our Gamecocks football team. There's no doubt he's learned from his time in Gainesville and it appears that he's got a solid plan to move the Gamecocks' program forward. He'll bring with him one of the best coaching staffs in the program's history. And, possibly most importantly, he'll bring an intensity on the recruiting trail to help win back the state and be a force in the region. He's proven his ability to coach defense and recruit great players. Now, it's just a matter of having his plan pay off.

I get it, second chance successes are rare in the head coaching world, and even rarer on the college level. But, maybe Muschamp's ability to lead a program is wrongly perceived. Maybe he took the wrong gig at the wrong time. He definitely deserved another shot at it after his dismissal at Florida. And he's definitely out to prove himself. So, why not? Why won't this work out?