ASU says goodbye to Gus

LITTLE ROCK — It’s possible that Arkansas State will play in its second consecutive GoDaddy.com bowl without the man who coached the Red Wolves during the regular season.

A year ago, incoming ASU Coach Gus Malzahn watched from the sideline and inside the press box at Ladd-Peebles Stadium as David Gunn served as interim coach a month after Hugh Freeze left ASU after one season to take the Ole Miss job. ASU ended up losing the game to Northern Illinois, 38-20.

On Sunday, the Red Wolves (9-3) accepted a bid to play Kent State in next month’s GoDaddy.com Bowl in Mobile, Ala. But neither ASU nor Malzahn said for certain Tuesday if Malzahn will be with them after he was introduced as Auburn’s new football coach during an on-campus news conference Tuesday night.

If Malzahn coaches ASU in four weeks, he’ll do so for the final time.

Malzahn leaves ASU less than a year after he was lured away from his Auburn offensive coordinator duties he held for three seasons and given a salary higher than any other ASU football coach had been given.

Malzahn, 47, agreed to take over for the fired Gene Chizik, three days after he led the Red Wolves to a 45-0 thrashing of Middle Tennessee in Jonesboro that gave the school its second consecutive Sun Belt Conference title.

According to a statement announcing Malzahn’s resignation, ASU Athletic Director Terry Mohajir said “the plan at this time” is for Malzahn to coach the bowl game.

But Malzahn was noncommittal during his introductory news conference.

“I need to talk to [ASU’s] administration and all that,” Malzahn said. “But I am 100 percent committed to Auburn and getting this thing going as soon as possible.”

Malzahn was named head coach at ASU last Dec. 14, but he didn’t actively participate in GoDaddy.com preparations. He didn’t officially take over at ASU until after Auburn participated in the Dec. 31 Chick- Fil-a Bowl and by that time it was too late for him to get involved in game prepatations.

In a year’s time, he won a conference title, ignited a fan base that had been awakened during Freeze’s 10-2 season in 2011 which helped spark a fundraising campaign that announced a planned facilities upgrade in September.

Can that continue even without Malzahn?

Rick Gillette, president of the Red Wolf Club, said he had followed Malzahn’s name being thrown around for openings at Auburn, Tennessee and Arkansas over the weekend like many fans, but it still stung a bit to learn of the final news Tuesday.

“I knew that there would be an interest with coach because of his success here and other places he’s been. There is always people looking,” Gillette said. “It’s still disappointing that we didn’t hold onto him a little longer.”

As president of the Red Wolf Club, a university backed booster group, Gillette’s task has been raising funds for Malzahn’s $850,000 base salary, significantly more than Freeze’s $202,160 deal, and the new $22 million facilities project.

He said he expects Malzahn’s departure to affect ASU’s fundraising momentum a bit.

“It is somewhat of a worry,” Gillette said. “I think the university is committed, I think the community is committed. I think everybody involved is committed.”

According to federal tax forms, the Red Wolf Club’s fundraising ranged from $1.46-2.4 million annually from 2006 to 2010 and Gillette said in an email to the Democrat-Gazette that it raised roughly $2.9 million in 2011.

In September, ASU announced plans for the $22 million football facility to be built in the north end zone at Liberty Bank Stadium, a 56,000 square-foot operations center that will include offices, weight rooms and locker rooms, and a 76,000-square foot indoor practice facility.

Liberty Bank’s $5 million donation kick-started the fundraising efforts and earned it naming rights to ASU’s 30,406-seat stadium. Wallace Fowler, CEO of Liberty Bank, said Tuesday fundraising for the project has reached the “$10 million range.”

Fowler said he doesn’t think the loss of Malzahn will have much affect on the fundraising efforts, citing momentum gained from the last two seasons that have produced a 19-5 record and commitment from Chancellor Tim Hudson and Mohajir, who was hired Sept. 20.

“It’s more than Gus,” Fowler said. “It’s the chancellor, it’s the new AD, it’s more than one person. It’s not going to hurt it. That’s my opinion.”

Fowler and Gillette do agree that ASU can hire the caliber of coach worthy of the contract Malzahn had been given.

Malzahn’s $850,000 base salary was highest in the Sun Belt Conference, and he could have seen that boosted to as much as $1.3 million next year if he had stayed. That total was contingent upon donations from Northwest Arkansas given to “The Touchdown Club,” a committee inside the Red Wolf Club that is charged with supporting the football program.

Gillette said he hopes for the Northwest Arkansas donations to remain.

“I think it’s a wait and see,” he said. “We’ve reached out to the entire state and even beyond our borders with fundraising. ... I think it will go on, and I think it could get better.”

As far as a replacement for Malzahn, Gillette and Fowler both said the salary level and ASU’s two conference titles can attract a coach similar to Malzahn’s reputation.

“We’ve been through this,” Fowler said. “As long as AState is at this level, you’re going to go through this if you get a winner.”

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette staff writer Matthew Harris contributed to this report.