We heard this rumor first starting up last month after Chris Eckert resigned but the story gained new legs recently with strong rumors recirculating that he had been offered and accepted the Wilby job.The last reliable rumor I heard was that Wilby Athletic Director Steve Baldwin had been calling around to coaches in the area to gauge their opinions on bringing in Cochran to be the Wildcats' next head coach. That was going on as early as last week.
Still, the New London Day reported Tuesday night that Cochran wasn't considering the job. "It's simply not true," Cochran told the Day. "I hope to get back into coaching again at some point, but have been busy looking at schools with Casey and haven't made any decisions yet."
That's the answer I expected from Cochran, whether it's a truthful response or not. His son, Casey Cochran, was the Gatorade Player of the Year and is being recruited by a number of nice Division I schools, including UConn, after leading Masuk to a perfect season and a Class L state title.
Then, Joe Palladino of the Republican-American tweeted that Cochran was among six or seven candidates that interviewed for the job on Tuesday.
For those not familiar with how big a name Jack Cochran is, here's a summary:
- He's won eight state championships in 16 years of coaching high school football in Connecticut, having won four in Bloomfield (1997-2000), three in New Britain (2001, 2003-04), and one in New London (2008).
- His overall record in 16 seasons as a head coach: 160-24-2 with 15 state playoff appearances, 15 league championships, and six runner-up finishes with his eight state championships.
- His teams achieved the No. 1 ranking in the final Hartford Courant poll four times and were twice named the top team in New England by NESN.
- He's been an assistant coach at Central Connecticut State University and the University of New Haven.
- He's coached 59 Division I college football players and 10 NFL players, including Dwight Freeney.
- He's coached over 100 all-state football players.
- He's worked with coaches including Urban Meyer, Steve Addazio, Kirk Ferenz, Kevin Gilbride, Tom Brockett, and Chris Anderson.
Sort of a big deal, but he was also fired several times for "Bobby Knight-like reasons," as columnist Michael Guerrera noted in this 2009 piece, and running impermissible baseball practices. He also is basically single-handedly responsible for the CIAC 50-point rule (nicknamed the "Cochran rule") after repeatedly running up the score on opponents. In fact, his teams won by at least 50 points four times in the 2005 season (the last season without the 50-point rule), including a 90-0 defeat of Griswold.
Still, this is very interesting and I think there is a foundation to this, as opposed to some of the other rumors we see posted on this blog. We haven't heard the last of this, I don't think.
