FORT COLLINS — It’s down to the buyout.
Negotiations continued Wednesday among University of Florida athletic department officials, Colorado State officials and Rams football coach Jim McElwain as McElwain moved closer to becoming the new coach of the Gators.
CSU officials, including president Tony Frank, entered the picture Wednesday morning to discuss the extent to which the $7.5 million buyout clause in McElwain’s contract would be enforced. McElwain, then-athletic director Jack Graham and Frank signed the coach’s new five-year contract in June, two months before the university announced it.
“I can’t comment on ongoing personnel discussions,” Frank said.
However, the discussions ended in late morning and CSU was standing its ground on the buyout, refusing to significantly lessen it, and that at least slowed down the process of Florida hiring McElwain.
McElwain’s contract, with annual rollovers that can be triggered by either side, includes an “extenuating circumstances” clause that could apply if McElwain signaled his intention to terminate the contract “without cause,” opening discussions about reducing the buyout. But the contract specifies that CSU “has no obligation” to reduce the buyout “in whole or in part.”
The buyout — officially “liquidated damages” — technically is McElwain’s responsibility, but Florida presumably would pay it.
The private plane carrying the Florida contingent, including athletic director Jeremy Foley and associate AD Lynda Tealer, departed from Fort Collins-Loveland Municipal Airport at 12:52 p.m. — without McElwain on board.
After arriving back in Gainesville, Foley declined to say much to assembled reporters. According to Mark Long of The Associated Press, Foley said: “We had a great conversation. We’re not there yet.” Foley added that there might be more news Wednesday night.
On Tuesday, Foley and Tealer flew to Fort Collins and met late into the evening with McElwain and his wife, Karen, at their home northeast of Fort Collins.
As of midafternoon Wednesday, the CSU players had not been informed of any news about McElwain, nor had they been notified of a team meeting.
McElwain, 52, led Colorado State to a 10-2 record this year, his third at CSU, and was . He also has that huge buyout. Florida already owes $6.3 million to Will Muschamp, whom it fired Nov. 16.
There is precedent for a coach’s move to a prominent program falling through over a buyout issue. In 1994, Texas Christian coach Pat Sullivan took the LSU job. But LSU said the buyout in his TCU contract was Sullivan’s responsibility, and TCU wouldn’t allow him to leave until the school was paid. Sullivan’s hiring was scuttled, and he stayed at TCU. LSU instead hired Gerry DiNardo of Vanderbilt. Sullivan remained at TCU for three more seasons.
Chuck Neinas of Boulder is the former head of the College Football Association and was commissioner of the Big Eight and also interim commissioner of the Big 12. He is the head of Neinas Sports Services, a consultant for schools in coaching searches.
“In general, the acquiring institution pays the buyout for the coach to move, but there are instances where it’s a cooperative arrangement, where the coach may pay a portion of it,” Neinas said.
Neinas also said he was involved in a search at a prominent program he wouldn’t name where the hired coach was getting a considerable raise and took out a loan to pay the buyout to his former school, and then paid if off over three years.
In late 2007, when Rich Rodriguez sought to move from West Virginia to Michigan, he had a $4 million buyout due. The situation got especially messy when West Virginia sued him, and a July 2008 out-of-court settlement led to Michigan paying West Virginia $2.5 million and Rodriguez paying his former school $1.5 million over three years.
Terry Frei: tfrei@denverpost.com or
