Tulane coordinator Will Hall is top candidate for Southern Miss job, reports say
Tulane offensive coordinator Will Hall is at the top of the candidate list to become the new football coach at Southern Miss, according to multiple reports.
Both FootballScoop.com and Adam Rittenburg of ESPN reported Tuesday that Hall is considered the top candidate, with FootballScoop.com reporting that the “Golden Eagles have zeroed in” on Hall.
Hall, who served the last two seasons on the Tulane staff, has head coaching experience through stints at a pair of Div. II schools — West Alabama and West Georgia. In his six seasons as a head coach, he led his team to the postseason four times and finished in first place in the Gulf South Conference on three occasions.
The Amory native has a career record of 56-20.
Tulane (5-5) is scheduled to close out the regular season with a Dec. 5 home game against Memphis.
Hall jumped to the FBS level in 2017, serving as the offensive coordinator at Louisiana-Lafayette for one year.
After one season as the associate head coach at Memphis, he took over as the Green Wave’s offensive coordinator ahead of the 2019 season.
The 40-year-old Hall is the son of Mississippi high school coaching legend Bobby Hall, who led programs at Biloxi, Amory and Madison Central.
Jay Hopson resigned as the USM coach after a 32-21 loss to South Alabama in the season opener.
Hopson was replaced on an interim basis by co-offensive coordinator Scotty Walden, who was hired as the head coach at Austin Peay on Oct. 27.
Assistant head coach Tim Billings has served as the interim coach for USM (2-7) since Walden’s departure.
Hopson made $500,000 a season as the USM head coach, but athletic director Jeremy McClain told the Sun Herald that the new head coach will likely have a salary that ranks in the top half of Conference USA.
Old Dominion’s Ricky Rahne ranks seventh out of the 14 head coaches with a salary of $775,000 a season. Seth Littrell at North Texas is the highest paid coach in C-USA at $1.85 million.
It’s been a rough season for the Golden Eagles that included a long list of players who have chosen not to play this season or transfer.
The low point of the USM season was likely a 66-24 to Tulane, which included 569 total yards by Hall’s offense. The Green Wave piled up 427 yards in the ground game, which has been an inconsistent part of the USM offense in recent seasons.
This story was originally published December 1, 2020 at 4:27 PM with the headline "Tulane coordinator Will Hall is top candidate for Southern Miss job, reports say."
