Minnesota comes calling

The college football coaching landscape is undergoing major changes, with universities across the spectrum losing or gaining field bosses over the past several weeks. The reason is simple: When one vacancy pops up at a big-time institution, another is created. (Alabama, which lured Nick Saban back to college from the NFL's Miami Dolphins, does not apply here.)

From time to time, TCU's Gary Patterson is courted by the so-called college football elite. His name surfaced as a possibility as the University of Miami this past year and has been linked to a number of institutions with, quite frankly, more to offer than TCU. Frogs fans better prepare to lose him to a tradition-rich national power some day, especially if he keeps piling up 10- and 11-win seasons.

But to the University of Minnesota? Minnesota is hardly what one would call a top-tier member of the Big 10. Much like Texas Tech, another state school in a BCS conference with little chance of consistently making a BCS game, Minnesota hardly seems like a place for a coach with designs on a national championship. Tech and Minnesota can be good, but they are too far from the spotlight to garner much consideration from voters. And the voters, like it or not, determine a team’s chances of landing atop the college football world in January through their preseason polls.

With so many better teams in the Big 10, Minnesota has no more than an academic shot at a national title. (TCU doesn’t even have that.) Hopefully, Patterson will be able to see through what is sure to be a slick sales job and stay at TCU. He has built a consistent winner and emerged from the shadow of former coach Dennis Franchione. Both seemed implausible just a few short years ago. Patterson clearly is not finished proving people wrong.

He would do himself a favor by choosing to continue turning heads in Fort Worth for a while.