Head coach of the
Ohio State University football team from
October 21, 1988 to
January 2, 2001 (yep, today!). Cooper was brought in after the firing of
Earl Bruce, who was mainly let go due to
personal differences. He was hired mainly on his 1986 victory over Michigan at the
Rose Bowl while coaching
Arizona State. Cooper overall is 111-43-4 for his time at
OSU and holds the second highest number of wins next to
Woody Hayes. However, during his time at OSU he has failed to win a single
Big 10 Championship and hold a pathetic 2-10-1 record against the schools rival, Michigan and only 3-8 in
bowl games.
At 4 PM EST it was announced that Cooper agreed to a buyout of his contract for the remaining amount of $1.8 million. I'd have to say that the attitude around Columbus is pretty positive. While Cooper's record was not too bad, he's done a horrible job in his duties in managing the team. The team has horrible academic records and a very low level of graduating players compared to other teams. Recently, one player achieved a 0.0 GPA. Cooper has publicly stated that he did not feel that his job was to motivate his players, which I think is one of the coaches main jobs.
Even worse, he's done a horrible job of keeping his players in line. There has been almost no discipline for poor academics or conduct. Before the Outback Bowl this season, one player had sued another for $50,000 over a fight that occured between the two in February. Neither of these players were punished for their conduct. There have been a number of recent conflicts between players, and the team just does not seem to be working together or really motivated to play.
Here in Columbus, the consensus seems to be that Cooper has not been doing his job as a coach, regardless of the record, and the poor performance at the Outback Bowl against South Carolina (not just in the score, but also the blatant personal fouls by the team) has made it clear that a drastic change needs to be made. While the problems cannot be entirely put on Cooper, his failure to take action to prevent things from getting worse has been the greatest contribution.
Now if we can just get Glen Mason down here and find a quarterback...