Mid-American Conference Coach of the Year 2012 award winner, Darrell Hazell, was named the new head coach of Purdue Boilermakers Wednesday. He was previously a head coach at Kent State University.
Purdue athletic director Morgan Burke took this decision because he wants to regain a prominent place for his team at the national level.
"I'm extremely excited to work with the players at Purdue, and I look forward to experiencing a lot of success in the future," Hazell said in a release issued by the college. "It's a wonderful opportunity."
Kent State had their first winning season since 2001 and the first bowl appearance during the last 40 years during Hazell's tenure as the head coach.
While studying in Muskingum University, Hazell was a starter of the football team for final three years. He graduated in 1986. For his services to the university football team, he was inducted into the Muskingum College hall of fame in 1993.
Before joining Kent State as head coach in December 2010, he held assistant coaching positions at Oberlin, Eastern Illinois, Penn, Western Michigan, Army, West Virginia, and Rutgers.
His longest tenure was with Ohio State (from 2004 to 2010), where he worked as the wide receivers coach under Jim Treshesel.
Hazell has a distinctive coaching style and it would be interesting to see if it will suit Burke's expectations, which leans towards an offensive style of play.
"We are an offensive-minded program. That's where we've made our mark over the years. I don't see that under the circumstances changing," Burke told reporters during Hazell's unveiling.
There is no doubt that Hazell can restructure Purdue; he has ability to judge talent and experience to hire efficient players, but the biggest matter of concern for the team and the new coach would be to curb falling attendance.
"We've lost a third of the fan base," Burke said. "We've gone from about 54,000 paid attendance in 2007-08 to 37,000 this past year.
"We can't do what we need to do resource-wise with losing a third of the fan base."
To increase attendance, the first ever black coach of Purdue, Hazell, will have to win big games and titles.
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