TUCSON, Ariz. — The Arizona Wildcats moved quickly following the departure of former head coach Jedd Fisch as they have now hired San Jose State head coach Brent Brennan to take over the football program, according to multiple reports.
This hire comes just three days after Fisch left to become the head coach at the University of Washington.
The terms of the deal have not been announced and are subject to the approval of the Arizona Board of Regents, but Brennan has reportedly agreed to a five-year deal.
12News reached out to the University of Arizona, but they were unable to confirm the move as of Tuesday morning.
Brennan, who will be the 31st head coach in University of Arizona history, comes to Tucson after spending the past seven years at San Jose State, turning the Spartans into a respectable program in the Mountain West Conference.
Brennan went 34-48 at SJSU with his best season coming in 2020, when he led the Spartans to a 7-1 record and an appearance in the Arizona Bowl in Tucson. The Spartans' .875 winning percentage in the COVID-shortened season was the third-best in Spartan football history and the best since 1940.
Brennan is the only SJSU coach to ever receive votes for the Associated Press Coach of the Year award and he was named the Mountain West Conference Coach of the Year in 2020.
He is the first head coach to ever lead the Spartans to three bowl games and 2020-2023 was the first time San Jose State had ever gone to three bowl games in four seasons.
This will be the second time the 50-year-old has worked in Tucson, as Brennan was a graduate assistant under Dick Tomey in 2000, Tomey's final season with Arizona.
Brennan began his coaching career in 1996 as an assistant coach at Woodside High School in California. His college career has also included stops at the University of Hawaii, the University of Washington, Cal Poly and Oregon State.
Brennan had two separate stints at San Jose State, the first lasting from 2005-10, where he worked several roles including wide receivers coach, special teams coordinator and recruiting coordinator. The first four seasons of this run at SJSU came with Tomey as the head coach.
Brennan also spoke at Tomey's memorial at the McKale Memorial Center in Tucson in 2019.
Brennan was hired as the Spartans head coach in 2017 after spending six years at Oregon State as a wide receivers coach.
Brennan played college football at UCLA from 1991-95.
This is a developing story. More details will be added as they are made available.
Arizona sports
The city of Phoenix is home to five major professional sports league teams; The NFL's Arizona Cardinals, NBA's Phoenix Suns, WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury, MLB's Arizona Diamondbacks and NHL's Arizona Coyotes.
The Cardinals have made State Farm Stadium in Glendale their home turf and the Footprint Center in downtown Phoenix is home to both the Suns and the Mercury. The Indoor Football League’s Arizona Rattlers play at Desert Diamond Arena in Glendale. The Coyotes play at Mullett Arena on ASU's Tempe campus.
Phoenix also has a soccer team with the USL's Phoenix Rising FC, who play at Phoenix Rising FC Stadium in Phoenix.
The Valley hosts multiple major sporting events on a yearly basis, including college football's Fiesta Bowl and Guaranteed Rate Bowl; the PGA Tour’s highest-attended event, the WM Phoenix Open; NASCAR events each spring and fall, including Championship Weekend in November; and Cactus League Spring Training for 15 Major League Baseball franchises.
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