Sac State interviewing assistants to replace Troy Taylor
Troy Taylor was the face of the Sacramento State football program from the time he was introduced as head coach five years ago this week.
But behind the scenes, Taylor’s coaching staff performed a lot of the heavy lifting that led to three consecutive Big Sky Conference championships and a No. 2 national FCS ranking this season, from recruiting and program building to game preparation, coaching and mentoring players.
That included Hornets assistant head coach Kris Richardson, defensive coordinator Andy Thompson and quarterbacks coach Bobby Fresques. All three were brought in by Taylor, who said multiple times that each of them shared responsibility for his three Big Sky Coach of the Year awards and the Eddie Robinson Award for coaching excellence.
Now, with Taylor leaving to coach the Stanford Cardinal, Richardson, Thompson and Fresques all want to take his place as the next head coach at Sacramento State. Each has spoken to Sacramento State athletic director Mark Orr in the days following the team’s crushing threepoint loss to Incarnate Word of Texas in an FCS quarterfinal, halting the Hornets’ season after a program-best 12-1 showing. All three met individually with Sacramento State president Robert S. Nelsen on Monday morning while Stanford held a news conference to formally introduce Taylor as its new coach.
Here’s the bonus twist: These three coaches, in separate conversations with The Sacramento Bee, all expressed a desire to remain together if one of them lands the job. Sacramento State will likely name a new coach much sooner than later, perhaps no later than midweek, to avoid recruiting uncertainty and instability for a program that figures to be ranked in the top five going into the 2023 season. It’s still unknown whether any additional candidates will be interviewed for the job.
Fresques, Richardson and Thompson did not disclose if they are in talks with Taylor to join his staff at Stanford, but what is clear is that the trio wants to remain with the Hornets. If Richardson is named head coach, he said he would “for sure want to keep Andy and Bobby” with Thompson remaining as defensive coordinator and Fresques taking Taylor’s role as offensive coordinator.
Richardson and Taylor were co-coaches at Folsom High School, where they won a string of championships. Richardson kept that train rolling after Taylor became offensive coordinator at Eastern Washington and then Utah, winning two more CIF state championships with Fresques by his coaching side.
Said Richardson, “I love being here. My family loves Sacramento. We love what we’ve built at Sac State, and we have all the pieces there to keep it going.”
Should Thompson become head coach, it’s quite likely Richardson would remain as assistant head coach and Fresques as offensive coordinator.
“I love this place,” Thompson said. “I’ve grown fond of it. We love the area, the family, the team. Looking back, that was a really tough loss the other night. We had a special season. I love how supportive the president and our AD have been, and I love working with Bobby and Kris.”
Fresques is a Sacramento State alum, a record-setting passer in the early 1990s when the Hornets were in the process of moving up from Division II to Division I. Adding to the bond these three candidates share, their wives are close friends who regularly meet before home games in festive tailgate scenes and later in the stands. Each of them feels the highs and lows of the profession.
“My first choice is to stay as head coach, or an assistant, and that has not changed since Day 1,” Fresques said. “It’s personal for me because I have so much history here. I played here, love this place, and our work is never done.”