After the worst three-year stretch in the history of the football program, Athletic Director Dave Brandon announced Tuesday that San Diego State coach Brady Hoke will succeed Rich Rodriguez as Michigan’s head football coach.

Hoke will become the program’s 19th coach in its 131-year history.

“We are pleased to announce the hiring of Brady,” Brandon wrote in the press release. “He is a terrific coach and will be a great ambassador and leader for our football program. We look forward to having him build a championship program on the field and in the classroom.”

University spokesman Rick Fitzgerald said University President Mary Sue Coleman would not comment on the hiring of Hoke until he is formally introduced in a press conference at 1 p.m tomorrow. He did, however, say that Coleman fully supported Brandon and the search process.

Hoke’s hiring comes on the heels of a week full of rumors and speculation about who would coach the Wolverines.

When Brandon announced that he would wait until after Michigan’s Jan. 1 bowl game, many were convinced that former Michigan quarterback Jim Harbaugh — tapped by many as a prototypical "Michigan Man" — would spurn his Stanford team to help return his declining alma mater to its glory days.

But when Harbaugh opted to coach the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers, the choice seemed to be Les Miles, another Michigan Man who played with Brandon under former coach Bo Schembechler in the 1970s. After meeting with Brandon on Monday, Miles quashed any speculation the next day, announcing his return to Baton Rouge, La.

With both Harbaugh and Miles out of the picture, the door opened for another Michigan Man — Hoke, who served as the Wolverines’ defensive line coach during the team’s 1997 National Championship run.

Following the announcement, Brandon denied that either Harbaugh or Miles were ever offered the job.

"The job was never offered to them," Brandon said. "We did have different discussions with them that were helpful and positive."

The athletic director maintained, six days after he cut ties with Rodriguez, that Hoke was his first choice.

Rodriguez was criticized throughout his 15-22 tenure for not understanding the tradition of college football’s most winningest program. So when Brandon announced that Michigan would undergo its second coaching search in three years, an understanding of the program’s history was naturally one of his criteria. And with eight years in Ann Arbor under his belt, Hoke definitively fit Brandon’s requirement.

“Brady Hoke understands Michigan and he wanted this job because it has been dream job," Brandon told the AP. "We won't have to teach him the words to 'The Victors,' and I believe our players will respond to him because I got 100 percent positive feedback from anybody who played for him here or since he left Michigan."

Aside from struggling to grasp Michigan’s traditions, Rodriguez’s teams were known for notoriously bad defense, finishing 108th, 82nd and 67th in total defense in the coach’s three years at the helm.

So when Brandon was asked about improving the Wolverines’ defense with a new coach, Brandon made his intentions clear.

“Is there a thought of getting a defensive-minded head coach? — There’s a thought of getting a defensive-minded everything,” Brandon said at last week's press conference. “I want the ball boys to be defensive-minded.”

And with Hoke, the Wolverines will get just that, as the coach turned San Diego State's 114th-ranked defense into the nation's 44th-ranked unit in just two years as the Aztecs’ coach.

Much of that may have been due to his defensive coordinator, Rocky Long, who runs a 3-3-5 defense similar to what former Michigan defensive coordinator Greg Robinson ran last season. But with Long primed to replace Hoke as San Diego State’s head coach, the Wolverines’ coordinator positions are wide open. That includes the offensive coordinator spot, as Calvin Magee took the same job at Pitt this afternoon.

Hoke’s coaching pedigree, however, has been a cause for concern for some — especially at the advent of Michigan’s coaching search when Hoke was named as a possible candidate.

In eight years as head coach of Ball State and San Diego State, Hoke finished a modest 47-50, with a 1-1 record in bowl games. He also managed just one win against a ranked team in both of his previous jobs combined.

The Big Ten will offer Hoke a serious competition upgrade from the Mid-American Conference and the Mountain West, and an offensive overhaul could be in store — the Aztecs ran a pro-style offense, with quarterback Ryan Lindley accounting for -33 yards on the ground in 2010.

And with Denard Robinson — one of the most dangerous running quarterbacks in NCAA history — at his disposal, Hoke’s approach to Michigan’s offense could be the talk of the next few weeks, especially since Robinson has yet to comment on whether he’d stay in Ann Arbor without Rodriguez as coach.

Question marks aside, Hoke has made it clear all along that — unlike Harbaugh and Miles — his career goal was to become head coach at Michigan. And with Brandon’s hiring of a Michigan Man, many alumni and current players have reacted positively to their new coach.

“This is a new start of what Michigan always has been,” redshirt junior defensive end Will Heininger said last night after a players' meeting. “And this is the kind of coach you want. Dave Brandon really did have a process as he explained in there and he stuck by it no matter what everybody said. He wanted the best person for us and that’s who we got.”

-The Associated Press and Daily News Editor Joseph Lichterman contributed to this report