PJ Fleck has reportedly been on the lookout for other jobs

Does the Matt Rhule revamp of the Nebraska football program have some other coaches in the conference nervous? Does the new look Big Ten have some of the middling programs in the conference a bit anxious about falling even further behind the cream of the crop?

If PJ Fleck did start looking for a new job this offseason, those are two reasons why he might have been checking things out. 

According to an anonymous coac, Fleck was on patrol for a new job this offseason. The man who has definitely been a thorn in Nebraska football’s side wanted away from Minnesota, according to this coach.

“I think P.J. [Fleck] chased UCLA and some other jobs pretty hard to get out of there, and it didn’t happen for him,” an anonymous coach allegedly said.

As SI reported, Fleck was a candidate for the UCLA job but this is the first time it’s been presented as Fleck “chasing” the job and not UCLA chasing him. And it’s definitely the first time it’s been described as Fleck trying “pretty hard to get out” of Minnesota.

Minnesota’s AD also disputes the idea that Fleck was trying to get out of town.

“P.J. and I have a really close relationship, and when UCLA reached out to him, he kept me up to speed on all those conversations,” Gophers athletics director Mark Coyle told the Star Tribune in March. “We feel really grateful that he should lead our program, and we look forward to having him do that for a long time.”

So where did the idea that Fleck was desperate to leave Minnesota came from? Was it sour grapes, or someone who knew the real story and that the Gophers were putting a happy spin on it.

However that whole thing went down, it looks like Fleck will be at Minnesota until at least 2029. And that means, while it won’t be this year, he can still be a thorn in the side of Nebraska football.