Gators should hire Spurrier immediately, if not sooner

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — The University of Florida will conduct a national coaching search to replace Ron Zook.

Why?

Here's how the Gators should conduct their search:

Florida Athletic Director Jeremy Foley should make a single phone call to Steve Spurrier and say this: "Steve, my brother, we want you to come home. Please? Pretty please? With sugar — and Chris Leak — on top?"

There's your national search.

One phone call.

If Spur-Dog doesn't want the job, then you move on. If he wants the job, you hire him.

Immediately.

UF President Bernie Machen and Foley made the only decision they could make Monday when they announced at a news conference the end of a Ron Zook coaching regime that was doomed from the beginning. And now, they should hold another news conference today to announce the old ball coach will become the new ball coach in Gainesville.

Hire Spurrier. Today. Get him on the road recruiting tomorrow. He can even take the Zooker with him to show him how it's done.

For those of you who say Spurrier would never return to the University of Florida, you're wrong. He wants to come back. He's got the itch. That's what his friends say.

"He wants the job," one FOS (Friend Of Spurrier) said Monday. "I think he really wants the job."

And if he didn't want the job, why wouldn't he have just said so Monday when the Sentinel ran him down at a charity golf tournament held by PGA and former UF golfer Chris DiMarco at Heathrow?

During a brief interview before teeing off, Spurrier certainly didn't talk like a man uninterested in once again taking over at his alma mater. Initially, he was purposefully vague ("I've become pretty good at saying nothing"), but he then opened up and said he "expects there to be some discussions" and even disputed widely circulated and erroneous reports that he wouldn't go back to work for Foley.

"Jeremy and I are friends," Spurrier said. "Why couldn't I work with Jeremy? I worked with him for 12 years. That's not a factor. The reason I left Florida was because I thought it was time to give the NFL a try. That's how that worked."

Does that sound like a man not interested in returning to UF?