Dan Wolken

USA TODAY Sports

A year ago at this time, South Carolina athletics director Ray Tanner was knee-deep in a long, pressure-packed coaching search with twists and turns he couldn’t possibly control. And when he finally wound up choosing Will Muschamp on Dec. 6 — 55 days after Steve Spurrier resigned abruptly in the middle of a disastrous 3-9 season — the decision was largely met with snickering from rival SEC fan bases and much of the national media.

After pursuing a handful of others, including Houston’s Tom Herman and Alabama defensive coordinator Kirby Smart, some perceived Muschamp to be a panic move that was made because South Carolina didn’t want to deal with any more rejections.

But this weekend, as South Carolina heads to Florida with a 5-4 record, a chance to get bowl eligible and an outside shot to win the SEC East, Tanner might be getting the last laugh.

While it’s true the East’s historic run of mediocrity has opened the door for South Carolina to make quick progress, a win this weekend arguably would make Muschamp the favorite to win SEC Coach of the Year (Non-Saban division, which is another matter altogether).

USA TODAY Sports college football staff picks for Week 11

At least in the short term, it appears Tanner may join the long list of athletics directors who didn’t “win the press conference” with their hires but may have found the right guy, a lesson to keep in mind as hiring season begins for this cycle.

“I never went into it thinking that there would be 100% approval on any decisions that were made,” Tanner told USA TODAY Sports this week. “I understand the scrutiny. There was some skepticism going into the process, but I wasn’t affected by that. It was so important we got the right person here.”

It was pretty clear by this week that Muschamp had enough of the questions about his return to Florida, where he went 28-21 over four seasons and was informed of his firing the day after a loss, ironically, to South Carolina on Nov. 16, 2014. And it’s hard to blame him.

It would be difficult to find any coach anywhere who has been as standup about a professional failure on a major stage as Muschamp, and frankly, it’s an old conversation by now.

The more illuminating story line to examine is why Muschamp is working at South Carolina when the conventional wisdom a year ago was that Tanner needed to hire an exciting offensive-minded coach, not an SEC retread with a defensive background who struggled at Florida because of some bad decisions (both in personnel and coaching) on the offensive side of the ball.

Bowl projections: Top four remain in playoff while other major bowls shuffle

Some critics all but counted Muschamp out before his first day on the job, making the illogical leap that because he didn’t work out at Florida there was no way he could do it at a program with fewer advantages.

Tanner knew those slings and arrows would come his way because, like everyone else, he watched what happened in Gainesville. But coaching searches can be as much about the intangibles as the statistics, especially at a place like South Carolina where you’re not going to win no matter what unless you can draw players from Atlanta and North Carolina and compete with Clemson on the small amount of in-state talent.

Under the surface of his win-loss record, Tanner saw the fit in both recruiting and how he dealt with off-field issues and responsibilities at Florida, which even Muschamp’s critics would agree was impeccable.

“I’ve been here a long time and felt like I understood our culture,” said Tanner, who won two national titles with six College World Series appearances as South Carolina’s baseball coach before moving into administration. “I was just so impressed, so comfortable with what he represents and his work ethic, his ability to communicate. I listened to what happened in the past and where he was professionally. I just was so excited about the fit and just felt strongly that our fan base would embrace him and he’d embrace them and we'd have a chance to get this thing going again, and I’m certainly very happy with where we are today.”

Under-the-radar college football games in Week 11

The Muschamp hire working out should also raise some questions about the popular theory in college athletics these days that there’s a big advantage to be gained in the search by firing a coach at midseason.

Though Tanner was able to do some legwork on candidates, the reality is that South Carolina’s search changed course multiple times after the early focus on Herman and then Smart, the possibility of which played some role in Georgia’s quick-trigger decision to fire Mark Richt.

Ultimately, as more jobs opened up, South Carolina was no longer in the front of the line, which is simply the reality most athletics directors will face when they go through this process in December.

“Timing is everything, and things change a long the way,” Tanner said. “I had a little more time to run some things out, but it didn’t necessarily make the process perfect. The thing that was important to us as we went through this is, I never worried about whether I was going to win the press conference.”

South Carolina is just winning games instead.

COACHING CAROUSEL CLIPS

On the other end of the spectrum, Fresno State was the first school on the board to hire a new coach this cycle by bringing in Jeff Tedford, a name that will win the press conference but should come with significant red flags.

The last time he was seen on the sidelines in college football, Tedford had allowed the University of California program to completely collapse both on the field and in the all-important Academic Progress Rate, which forced the school to impose restrictions that could help avoid NCAA penalties.

There is little in Tedford’s final six years at Cal to suggest he’s capable of reversing the slide at Fresno State under Tim DeRuyter, which has left the program in a big 1-9 hole this season. The fact is, Tedford had good players at Cal throughout his tenure, including 22 NFL draft picks over his final five seasons in which his teams went a combined 20-25 in the Pac 10/12. (By comparison, Oregon State had 14 draft picks over the same span and went 26-19.)

Fresno State names Jeff Tedford head coach

There’s a reason Tedford had been floating around the Canadian league and landed this year at Washington in a non-coaching/consultant position without much traction in head coaching searches.

Moreover, the contract Fresno State gave him — he’ll reportedly make $1.6 million per year, making him the Mountain West’s highest-paid coach — sent shockwaves through the industry given that Fresno State was basically bidding against itself.

But given Tedford’s moniker as the winningest coach in Cal football history and his ties to Fresno State as an alum in the early 1980s and assistant coach from 1992-97, he’ll be highly popular for a while. Whether he can restore the Bulldogs to prominence is another matter altogether.

Nick Saban says he had no idea that Tuesday was Election Day

FAUX PAS OF THE WEEK

It’s perfectly understandable for coaches to avoid politics in the aftermath of a heated presidential election. No matter where Nick Saban actually stands politically — and there’s actually been quite a bit of speculation about this over the years given that he has donated in the past to Democrat Joe Manchin’s Senate campaign, as they are childhood friends from West Virginia — anything he might have said about Tuesday’s result would have offended roughly half his fan base and drawn unnecessary media attention.

But Saban actually might have outsmarted himself by claiming he “didn’t even know (the election) was happening,” a statement that is so hard to believe it actually ended up as a headline just about everywhere.

Saban certainly likes to project the image he’s laser-focused on football, and there’s no doubt he structures his life to ensure a minimum amount of distractions. But if you're really so deep in the football bunker that the presidential election got by you this time, that’s not endearing, it’s just weird.

YOUR WEEKLY HARBAUGH

You know Jim Harbaugh has reached cultural icon status when last week’s episode of The Simpsons referenced him. In the brief exchange while Homer Simpson is talking to his wife Marge, he says, “Kirk is like a sports genius who everyone hates.” Marge responds: “Worse than Jim Harbaugh?”

According to the Detroit Free Press, Harbaugh basically took it in stride and said it was one of his favorite shows.

“People have been making sport of me since I can remember,” Harbaugh said. “My earliest memories, 5, 6, 7, 8, in the schoolyard. People would make sport of me. But it was pretty high class being on The Simpsons.”

Blind study: Comparing two College Football Playoff contenders

DUD OF THE WEEK

Just a few years ago, Rice was on a nice little run of success including a Conference USA title in 2013. But things have gone sour on David Bailiff in a hurry, and his program reaches a new low Saturday when it travels to Charlotte as a 10.5-point underdog to Charlotte. In fairness, the 49ers have played some decent football lately and are coming off back-to-back road wins at Marshall and Southern Miss.

Still, Charlotte is only in its second year of FBS play and fourth season as a program. It went 2-10 last season and shouldn’t be a double-digit favorite over anyone. But at 1-8 and 0-6 in the league, Rice is only one loss away from claiming the title as worst team in the country.

TOP 10 GAMES IN WEEK 11