Long before the Bill Belichick shocker, Kentucky nearly hired a Super Bowl winner
Last week, North Carolina shocked the football world by convincing six-time Super Bowl winner Bill Belichick to join the college ranks as head coach of the Tar Heels.
Two decades earlier, Kentucky almost shocked the football world by nearly convincing a two-time Super Bowl winner to join the college ranks as head coach of the Wildcats.
In fact, the coach that UK athletic director Mitch Barnhart pursued and nearly caught was Belichick’s old boss, a Hall of Famer named Bill Parcells.
“There was significant interest on his part,” said Barnhart during an interview this week. “We didn’t feel like in any way, shape or form he was pulling our leg. There was genuine, heartfelt interest in Kentucky.”
The year was 2002. After a brief two-year stint as the Wildcats head coach following Hal Mumme, Guy Morriss had left for Baylor. Previously the athletic director at Oregon State, Barnhart had been hired as UK’s AD to replace Larry Ivy just five months before Morriss’ exit. Suddenly, Kentucky and its new AD were in the market for the school’s third football coach in four seasons.
Meanwhile, after winning Super Bowl titles with the New York Giants in 1987 and 1990 — with Belichick as the Giants’ defensive coordinator — Parcells had retired as coach of the New York Jets at the conclusion of the 1999 season.
However, three seasons later, the then 61-year-old Parcells was looking to return to coaching. And Barnhart was looking for a new coach, one who would make a considerable splash.
“We had some people in our program that had connections to Coach Parcells,” Barnhart said. “It was really enjoyable to hear him talk about the love of the game of football and his desire to coach. We had some really cool conversations.”
Horse racing was maybe the biggest connection. Parcells was and is a huge horse racing fan. In fact, he owned graded stakes winner Three Technique, whom Parcells had purchased for $180,000 at the 2018 Fasig-Tipton Kentucky Select Yearling Sale.
“He had connections to so many people in Lexington and Kentucky from the horse racing perspective,” Barnhart said. “That was another allure of the Kentucky job.”
John Cropp was another connection. Then an assistant athletic director under Barnhart, Cropp had served as an assistant coach at Vanderbilt with Parcells under Steve Sloan in 1973-74. The two had remained friends.
“To hear John Cropp and Bill Parcells talk football was awesome,” Barnhart said.
The fact that Kentucky was on NCAA probation resulting in a loss of 19 scholarships and a two-year bowl ban didn’t deter Parcells from visiting the UK campus. It even got to the point where Parcells was talking about staff possibilities.
“I felt we had a really good chance, I really did,” Barnhart said. “But you never know. In any of these coaching searches, you have to get them to the finish line.”
Before Kentucky could get Parcells to the finish line, Jerry Jones happened.
“The issue we ran into as we continued conversations was this organization called the Dallas Cowboys,” Barnhart said.
Parcells accepted Jones’ offer and coached four seasons in Dallas, going 34-30 with a pair of playoff appearances. He retired again after the 2006 season. Since then, Parcells has worked stints as an analyst for ESPN, vice president of football operations for the Miami Dolphins and a consultant for the Cleveland Browns.
Meanwhile, all’s well that ends well. Instead of Parcells, Kentucky hired Rich Brooks, another former NFL head coach who had led Oregon to a Rose Bowl appearance before spending time coaching in the professional ranks.
Brooks navigated the NCAA probation and eventually built a program that went 30-22 his last four seasons, upset No. 1-ranked and eventual national champion LSU in 2007 and played in four consecutive bowl games before Brooks retired after the 2009 season.
“It worked out like it was supposed to,” Barnhart said. “Coach Brooks came in, and I think it takes a really principled, heartfelt, tough person to take on the role that we had back then. The contributions he made to Kentucky, I’ll be forever thankful. He’s our Hall of Fame coach.”
This story was originally published December 20, 2024 at 7:00 AM.
