Georgia Tech fires Jason Semore, 3 assistants at 2-7

The fuse was lit Saturday in a 44-17 home beatdown by Louisville. By Monday afternoon the news was out, and it was a lot more than a coordinator.

Pete Thamel

@PeteThamel

Sources: Georgia Tech has dismissed four staff members – defensive coordinator Jason Semore, defensive ends coach Kyle Pope, offensive line coach Allen Mogridge and wide receivers coach Jafar Williams. Georgia Tech is 2-7 this season and in last place in the ACC.

Semore, o-line coach Allen Mogridge, d-ends coach Kyle Pope and wide receivers coach Jafar Williams are all out, and Semore, Mogridge and Williams were all hired just this past offseason. That's the part that stings. Georgia Tech went 9-4 last year, and 2-7 is its worst start since 1994's 2-10 team. After the Louisville game Key called the coaching and the play "embarrassing," and said he was "damn pissed off." Turns out he meant it.

The school didn't just fire people, it moved everyone else around too. DBs coach Vinnie Sunseri gets the defensive play-calling, and the name that made everybody do a double take is DeAndre Hopkins. Yes, that DeAndre Hopkins. Nuk is now the primary wide receivers coach.

Chris Vannini

@ChrisVannini

News: Georgia Tech has fired DC Jason Semore, OL coach Allen Mogridge, OLB/DE coach Kyle Pope and WR coach Jafar Williams. The Yellow Jackets are 2-7. Here are the new coaching duties including DeAndre Hopkins moving up:

Brandon Torrey takes over the o-line, d-line coach Jess Simpson picks up the d-ends and outside linebackers, and senior analyst Jack Tyler gets the linebackers. Key's statement made it clear this was a slow burn that finally boiled over, not a snap decision on a Monday.

And the schedule is hilarious, if you're not a Tech fan. The first game under the new setup is Saturday at Clemson. Hopkins goes back to Death Valley wearing the other team's colors, and Clean Old Fashioned Hate with Georgia is less than 3 weeks away. Dabo Swinney got asked about it Monday night and had nothing but love for his old receiver.

Chapel Fowler

@chapelfowler

Clemson coach Dabo Swinney on former Tigers wide receiver DeAndre Hopkins getting elevated to primary wide receivers coach at Georgia Tech: "I'm proud of Nuk. ... Kind of a crazy deal there where they fired four coaches, but shoot, he's been there all year. He knows those guys"

Dabo also did the thing every coach does and said Tech is better than its record. They've been right there in every game, he said, but they keep turning it over. Then came the line that should worry Clemson a little: it's too late for the new staff to run something completely different, "but there's also nothing to lose."

Tuesday was Key's turn at the podium, and he didn't hide. He said he chose to bring these coaches here, so letting them go is on him. He told the staff that's left not to get comfortable. He said Jafar Williams' firing had nothing to do with Hopkins, and he called Mogridge a great man and a great father, but the line just didn't look the way it was supposed to. He also faced the obvious question of why Godsey kept his job when the offense has been as bad as the defense. His answer was that offense and defense are different animals, and it matters who's actually available to fill the job. On defense, he wants simple calls the players can execute, and he thinks Sunseri can give them that.

The most interesting part was Key owning how the last staff got built. He said the hiring timing was bad, he thought he had the right guy, and it didn't work. Some things he saw on film from these coaches at their old jobs never showed up in Atlanta. So he's flipping the order this time.

Kelly Quinlan

@Kelly_Quinlan

Key said that the plan is to hire a coordinator first, then staff, and then work the portal for both retention and new players. It was backwards in timing last year, and that cannot be backwards. That was a huge problem in the roster construction and staff construction.

Coordinator first, then staff, then the portal. Pretty simple, and the fact that it needed saying tells you how badly last offseason went. As for why Saturday was the one that broke him, Key gave the most honest answer a coach can give.

Kelly Quinlan

@Kelly_Quinlan

On why Saturday was the breaking point, he can't say. He said frustration happens all the time, but when you watch things you know should be different, planned to be different, and are not the way they are supposed to be. The same mistakes over and over, or the lack of adjustment within, is a tipping point. That was his.

So the DC job is open again, and the Jackets Online hotboard is already floating names for Key and AD Ryan Alpert. Before any of that matters, Sunseri gets his first look calling a defense against Clemson, and Hopkins gets his first game as a lead position coach in the stadium where he became Nuk. There are 3 games left to show this wasn't just rearranging deck chairs. Then comes the hire that decides whether Key gets back to 9-win seasons or ends up on the other side of a press release like this one.