The Sunday Night Massacre: Bresnahan, Wulff, Cooper All Fired From USF Football

If you've been wondering about the lack of football content on this blog this week, it was because we were waiting for this to happen. We heard it might happen last Monday, then Tuesday, then we heard it would be early next week... and quite frankly, we probably had enough to write it ourselves awhile ago.

It's hard to start looking forward to the next season until you know what's coming, and speculating over the lives & jobs of people until things are official is tough. Sometimes it's better to wait so people can hopefully find new jobs before they cut ties with previous ones. But this wasn't a secret to those close to the program, and was only a matter of time.

Well now it's official: From Josh Newberg at Bulls247.com

According to multiple sources, Bulls247.com has learned that USF has fired offensive coordinator Paul Wulff, defensive coordinator Chuck Bresnahan and defensive backs coach Ron Cooper.

Bresnahan joined USF after a long NFL career as an assistant and defensive coordinator with the Raiders and Bengals, and was in the UFL most recently before coming to Tampa.

Wulff came from the 49ers where he was a senior offensive assistant, but before that was the head coach for four seasons at Washington State (his alma mater). His firing means USF will have three offensive coordinators in each of Willie Taggart's first three seasons with the Bulls.

Cooper has 30 years of experience as an assistant at 12 different schools, including 3 different SEC schools & Notre Dame. He also had one year with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before joining USF in 2013.

There are lots of questions that need to be answered. We'll start here:

Does USF change their philosophy on either side of the ball?

Is the 3-4 defense, borne out of necessity this year, coming back in 2015?

Will Willie Taggart, the only constant the USF offense has known, stay with the run heavy style that has ranked near the bottom in America? To be fair, he hasn't had the players to implement it either... but are those players coming? Because they better make it to campus real fast.

And perhaps the most important question: What quality coordinator is taking a USF job without a lot of guaranteed money in their contract? There was a lot of heat on Willie Taggart already after this season... who can you get to come here for what might be a one-year gig?

The Bulls haven't beaten anyone by more than one possession in two seasons, and got their three FBS wins in 2014 against teams that combined to win five FBS games themselves (with three of them against each other). That doesn't seem like a lot of job security unless you can turn it around fast.

These are all questions that need to be answered quickly: National Signing Day is just 57 days away.