His contract. The 2007 recruiting class. Two vacant assistant positions. The 2007 schedule.
Winter conditioning is a few days away, and signing day for recruits is Feb. 7 for the Montana Grizzlies, who finished the 2006 season 12-2 and ranked No. 3 in the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision.
Looming over all of that is the fact that Hauck, 41-13 in four seasons as the Grizzlies' head coach, has yet to sign a 3-year contract that's been the table for nearly three months. There are several reasons why, though Hauck is loathe speaking about them.
“Two things that I'll never talk about on the record are contract and salary, and speculation on my job,” he said Friday.
Conceivably the two subjects could be related, since Hauck's name has repeatedly surfaced in connection with the vacant head coaching job at the University of Minnesota.
A story in Saturday's Minneapolis Star-Tribune mentioned Hauck in connection with a series of interviews Minnesota officials held in Dallas on Friday.
Hauck was in his office Friday morning, though two sources in Missoula said Hauck had interviewed with the Gophers. His is one name among a group that has grown to include Southern California offensive coordinator Lane Kiffin, Texas Christian coach Gary Patterson, Notre Dame offensive coordinator Mike Haywood, and North Dakota State coach Craig Bohl.
Asked about the Gophers' job on Friday, Hauck, who made a strong bid for the Stanford job in December, said little.
“I've got a good job, a good team,” he reiterated. “I have not been there (Minneapolis) in numerous years. Last time I was there I played golf, three years ago.”
In the meantime, recruiting is the most pressing concern. Montana had some recruits in town over the weekend. Thus far just two high school players - Helena High's Matt Hustad and Ryan Fetherington - have committed to the Griz.
Montana lost just eight seniors off last year's team, and as of now has just five full grants in aid available. Hauck prefers to get a larger group, splitting the scholarship money more ways with promises of full rides in 2008-09. That in turn would make next year's recruiting class more manageable: There will be as many as 27 seniors on the 2007 Grizzlies.
“It's been a fairly low-key, relaxed recruiting season just because we don't have many scholarships,” said Hauck. “We're trying to piece together a class as best we can with the aid we've got.
“That's probably not going to come together for another couple weeks - these next three weeks will be rapid-fire. We'll be working hard at it.”
Beyond that is a schedule that is missing one game, either the third or fourth Saturday in September. There there are the jobs vacated by quarterbacks coach Steve Axman and running backs coach Luther Carr. Both took higher-paying jobs with the University of Idaho.
Hauck wasn't sure when he'd fill their positions.
“There's a lot going on contractually that we need to get ironed out before we're able to proceed with that,” he said.
Montana athletic director Jim O'Day is hoping the contract issue is resolved soon. It calls for Hauck to get a base salary of $124,000, plus incentives.
At question, for starters, is whether the contract is at least on a par with other football programs in the Big Sky Conference, which Montana has won at least a share of the title the past nine seasons.
There's also buyout language that calls for Montana to receive whatever the balance of the contract is as a penalty should Hauck take another job. It means if Hauck signed his deal and a year from now left for another program, UM would be due $248,000.
In October O'Day felt that amount was steep, but now he's not so sure.
“I know that was a concern of his (Hauck's) before, but now it's looking smarter,” O'Day said this week. “If (other schools) want you bad enough, they'll pay.”
Meanwhile, each assistant coach is due a $5,000 raise under the new contract, O'Day said. Incentives written into the deal - Montana won the Big Sky championship outright and advanced to the FCS semifinals - are worth another $5,000 for each assistant. That's when, or if, the contract is signed.
“It's not a bad contract,” O'Day said. “It's one of those things Š every coach in America has the same thing. There aren't that many one-year contracts.”
It is conceivable that Hauck could sign another one-year deal, like the last one he signed in October 2005. O'Day does feel the new contract could be better, but is at least a step in the right direction.
“That's not to say we won't continue to fight to get them high compensation,” he added.
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