Dan Lanning has already lived through the grind of replacing coordinators, and now Oregon is back in that same spot again.
Since arriving in Eugene, Lanning has cycled through five primary offensive and defensive coordinators, and three of them moved on to head coaching jobs. After firing offensive coordinator Drew Mehringer seven games into the 2026 season, Lanning handed play-calling duties to Jay Johnson on an interim basis. With the job open, the usual fan chatter has kicked up around familiar names - including Northwestern offensive coordinator Chip Kelly, whose Oregon ties go back to the Ducks’ rise under him from 2009-12.
But Mike Norvell’s name carries a different kind of weight.
Norvell’s dismissal at Florida State has put him in the conversation for Oregon’s opening, and the connection is a real one. Lanning and Norvell have worked together at three different programs, and Norvell was the coach who gave Lanning his first full-time FBS assistant job at Memphis. Lanning has also pointed to Norvell as one of the coaches who helped shape how he runs Oregon.
Norvell, 45, built his own head-coaching résumé at Memphis and Florida State. He took over Memphis in 2016, then became Florida State’s head coach for the 2020 season. Along the way, he won conference championships at both stops and collected national coach of the year honors.
His peak at Florida State came in 2023, when the Seminoles opened 13-0 and won the ACC before being left out of the four-team College Football Playoff. That season brought Norvell both the Dodd Trophy and the Paul “Bear” Bryant Coach of the Year Award.
The appeal is easy to see. Norvell has long been known as one of college football’s most inventive offensive minds, leaning on tempo, multiple personnel groups and a flexible running game to stress defenses. He also spent seven seasons recruiting in Florida, giving him experience in one of the country’s richest talent pools.
At Memphis, Norvell turned the Tigers into a conference champion and delivered the program’s first outright conference title since 1969. Over four seasons, he went 38-15, capped by a school-record 12 wins, the American Athletic Conference championship and a Cotton Bowl berth in 2019.
His Florida State run ended after seven seasons and a 3-5 start in 2026.
The Norvell-Lanning relationship goes back even further than Memphis. They first crossed paths at Pittsburgh in 2011, when Lanning was a graduate assistant and Norvell was co-offensive coordinator on Todd Graham’s staff.
When Graham moved to Arizona State, both coaches followed. Norvell handled offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach duties there, while Lanning worked in defensive and recruiting roles in 2012 and 2013.
Lanning later spent time at Sam Houston State as defensive backs coach and co-recruiting coordinator before joining Alabama as a graduate assistant for the Crimson Tide’s 2015 national championship season. After Norvell became Memphis head coach, he brought Lanning with him in 2016 to coach inside linebackers and serve as recruiting coordinator for two seasons.
That shared history has clearly left a mark on Lanning. He has said publicly that Norvell, Nick Saban and Kirby Smart all influenced the way he thinks about coaching, and that he pulled pieces from each stop to build Oregon’s offensive identity around versatility, physicality and quarterback play.
“Yeah, I think ultimately, getting to watch Nick and Kirby both, Mike, there were things that you walked away with. And as a head coach, you're like, OK, I want this to be a part of what we do,” Lanning said.
He has also been blunt about what he admires in Norvell.
“Mike has a crazy passion for the game,” Lanning said in 2024 on Bussin’ With The Boys. “When it comes to his intensity, you want to see that start at the top.
You want a head coach that you know he’s not going to ask you to do anything that he’s not willing to do. He put in the work, he put in the time.
He looked at things outside the box, right? … A guy that’s willing to put in everything that they have for us to be successful and willing to adapt and change.”
That adaptability is part of the backdrop in Eugene right now, too. Lanning has had to manage quarterback Dante Moore’s injury and a midseason change in offensive play-calling while sorting through the coordinator search. He has said he’s watching developments across college football and the NFL, but doesn’t expect a hire to come “right around the corner.”
For now, Norvell’s availability simply adds another familiar name to the mix. Whether the two coaches cross paths again is still an open question, but Lanning’s respect for Norvell is already well established.
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Jayden Reid made a few key plays late to help close it out, the sort of finishing touch that can swing a tight nonconference game and leave a home crowd feeling better about whats ahead. Iowa State got a lift from Ryan Prather Jr., who led the Cyclones in scoring off the bench, and now turns quickly to Southern Miss with a chance to reset. [Read more 🡒]