Haywood Interviews with Washington

Here is the Seattle Times story. Evidently, Rivals.com broke the story.

ByBob Condotta

Seattle Times staff reporter

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Polldaddy.comOn the day the University of Washington completed an expected procedural step in the search for a new football coach, there was also a report of a new candidate for the job — Notre Dame offensive coordinator Mike Haywood.

Rivals.comreported that Haywood was scheduled to arrive in Seattle on Wednesday night and is expected to interview today with UW athletic director Scott Woodward. The two know each other from years when they both worked at Louisiana State, where they crossed paths from 1999 to 2002. Haywood was an assistant at LSU from 1995 to 2002 and recently called Woodward “a very good friend.”

According to the Rivals report, Haywood was not at Notre Dame’s practice Wednesday and had been granted permission to interview for the job.

He is a 1986 graduate of Notre Dame and has worked with the Irish since 2005. He was named assistant coach of the year by the American Football Coaches Association in 2005.

However, Notre Dame’s offense has struggled this season and coach Charlie Weis announced this week he was retaining play-calling duties, which he had taken over last week when Haywood missed practices due to the death of a cousin. Haywood, 44, was a flanker and cornerback as a player at Notre Dame.

Woodward said earlier in the day that the Huskies were not close to naming a coach.

“This is kind of like courting your wife or girlfriend,” he said. “We are at the hand-holding and kissing stage. We are not at the altar yet.”

Part of the process included naming the 13-person advisory committee.

Unlike most coaching searches at UW, however, the committee was not named a “search” committee as it has been made clear that president Mark Emmert and athletic director Woodward will make the ultimate decision.

“It is clearly an advisory committee that is set forth to give us the qualities and characteristics they want the next coach to have,” Woodward said.

The committee will be chaired by Pat Dobel, a professor of public affairs who is UW’s faculty athletic representative to the Pac-10.

The committee, made up of faculty, coaches and community members, also includes quarterback Jake Locker and former receiver Andre Riley.

In a news release, the school said that the committee “is expected to provide its input to the search process by the first week of December.”

That indicates a hire of sometime after the first week of December, though Woodward said it doesn’t rule out that an announcement could come more quickly.

But he said the likelihood is it won’t happen until early to mid-December.