Report: Troy expected to fire head coach Chip Lindsey

Troy University is expected to hire head football coach Chip Lindsey, according to a report from Yahoo! Sports’ Pete Thamel.

Lindsey, who was hired in 2019, went 5-7 in his first campaign with the Troy Trojans, a win total he never was able to surpass. Lindsey followed it up with a 5-6 record in the abbreviated 2020 season, and in 2021, Troy went 5-6 before opting to fire its head coach.

Lindsey’s firing came just one day after Troy was blown out at home, losing to Appalachian State 45-7. Troy managed just 142 yards of total offense, including an abysmal 33 rushing yards and just six first downs the entire game.

Troy, with one regular-season game remaining against Georgia State, is expected to name defensive coordinator Brandon Hall as the interim head coach, Thamel clarified in a separate tweet. Troy still has the opportunity to play in a bowl game in the event that it can pull off a victory on the road over Georgia State. The Panthers, who are 6-5 on the season, opened up as slight, 5.5-point favorites over the Troy Trojans.

With Lindsey on his way out, Troy became the 14th FBS school to fire its head coach before the season even concluded. The others include Akron, Florida, FIU, LSU, UMass, TCU, Troy, USC, Virginia Tech, Washington, Washington State, UConn, Texas Tech and Georgia Southern. Only three of the aforementioned schools have replaced their former head coach: UConn hired Jim Mora, Texas Tech hired Joey McGuire and Georgia Southern hired Clay Helton.

Troy’s offense has put on a subpar performance in 2021, despite Lindsey being hired in part for his offensive prowess. The Trojans average just 24.6 points per game, good for sixth of 10 teams in the Sun Belt, and their rushing offense ranks second-to-last in the conference with just 96.1 yards per game and 3.2 yards per carry.

The bar was set relatively high for Lindsey, though he was never able to reach the status that former Troy head coach Neal Brown did. Brown, hired in 2015, coached Troy to a 4-8 record in his first year at the helm, then followed it up with a 10-3 season, an 11-2 season and another 10-3 season, before departing after the 2018 season to accept the head coaching job at West Virginia. Neal won three consecutive bowl games; Lindsey was unable to even make it to one.

Since moving to the Sun Belt in 2004, Troy has finished with a record of .500 or better in 10 of 18 seasons, along with winning six Sun Belt titles since 2006 (four of which were shared titles).