Willie Taggart Named FSU Head Coach After 1 Year at Oregon

After just one year at Oregon, Willie Taggart has been named Jimbo Fisher's replacement at Florida State, the school announced.

Pete Thamel of Yahoo Sports reported Taggart's contract is for six years, $30 million.

College football reporter Brett McMurphy first reported that Taggart reached agreement Tuesday to take over the Seminoles.

Taggart spent three years at Western Kentucky and four at South Florida before landing at Oregon, in both cases starting off slowly with a 2-10 season before turning things around for the better. He helped South Florida earn its first 10-win season in history in 2016.

The Ducks made a quicker turnaround under the new coach, going 7-5 in his first year after managing just a 4-8 record the year before.

While the 41-year-old has a mere 47-50 career record in FBS, it doesn't quite show the job he has done to improve teams from where they were before arriving.

The former Western Kentucky quarterback has especially shown an ability to develop high-powered offenses at multiple locations.

Even without much time at Oregon, Taggart was a wanted man for multiple top programs this offseason, causing his own school to offer him an extension worth about $20 million over five years, per Andy Staples of Sports Illustrated.

Unfortunately for the Ducks, it wasn't enough to keep him at his current location.

This represents a rare change of pace for Florida State, which has only had two head coaches since 1976. 

Fisher led the team to a national championship just four years ago, but he chose to leave for Texas A&M after a down year that produced a 6-6 record.

Taggart will try to take an extremely talented roster that underachieved last season back into national title contention.