KU Football Coach Search Hot List

? 1. Turner Gill (Buffalo)
? 2. Skip Holtz (Eastern Carolina)
? 3. Kevin Sumlin (Houston)
? 4. Jim Harbaugh (Stanford)
? 5. Houston Nutt (Ole Miss)

Welcome to “The Coach Search Blog”, your one-stop shop for Kansas University coach search information!

As the search for Kansas University’s next head football coach moves forward, we’ll be updating this blog periodically throughout the day with various pieces of news — links, tidbits, analysis — pertaining to potential KU candidates. Basically, we’ll attempt to gather and aggregate information from the Web and elsewhere in an attempt to provide readers with the most up-to-date news involving the coach search.

In addition, we’ll keep our “KU Football Coach Search Hot List” — featured above — updated as new information comes in.

So, on that note, here’s a quick synopsis on one of today’s developments:

With Ole Miss’ Houston Nutt now officially out of the running for the Kansas job, KU fans can turn their attention back to the array of remaining coaching candidates.

Here’s guessing some of today’s wild rumors and speculation will center on Stanford’s Jim Harbaugh.

In a sideline interview with ESPN’s Michelle Tafoya during Monday night’s Baltimore Ravens-Green Bay Packers game, Harbaugh said he hadn’t spoken with anyone regarding the vacancy left by the departure of Notre Dame’s Charlie Weis.

Harbaugh also indicated that he’s happy at Stanford, and Stanford athletic director Bob Bowlsby, speaking with the New York Times, said there was “absolutely no chance” of Harbaugh coaching at Notre Dame next season.

The story didn’t mention anything about Kansas, but it’s hard to imagine a hot coach passing on a chance to coach at Notre Dame so that he can work at Kansas, a program that has gone to back-to-back bowl games just once in its history.

Still, Kansas fans will continue to cling to things like this: Harbaugh was reportedly in the Kansas City area last week and paid a visit to Kansas commit and four-star Blue Springs (Mo.) High receiver Keeston Terry, and an ESPN story today implies that Cincinnati’s Brian Kelly is close to an agreement with Notre Dame, meaning that Harbaugh might be out of the running for the South Bend gig.

That might give Harbaugh, who’s wife is from nearby Belton, Mo., reason to look a little closer at the Kansas vacancy. At the moment, though, it doesn’t seem like a large step up for Harbaugh, who is 17-19 in his three seasons at Stanford but recently led the Cardinal to an 8-4 regular season and berth in the Sun Bowl.

For more updates, check back to KUSports.com throughout the day.