James Madison coach Bob Chesney has emerged as the target of UCLA's coaching search, sources told ESPN.
He's set to sign a five-year deal with UCLA, according to ESPN sources, that will be finalized after James Madison's Sun Belt championship game.
Chesney's James Madison team is 11-1 this season and plays Troy this week in the Sun Belt championship game. UCLA has agreed with James Madison that Chesney will coach the Dukes if JMU wins the Sun Belt and ends up in the College Football Playoff field as one of five highest-ranked conference champions.
Chesney informed his team of his intention to leave Tuesday, sources told ESPN. Chesney jumped to the top of the list of candidates in this frenetic college coaching cycle, drawing interest for a number of the top openings, as JMU is ranked No. 19 in both the Associated Press and AFCA Coaches polls.
Once finalized, UCLA gets a coach with a consistent track record of winning, as athletic director Martin Jarmond and the UCLA search committee quickly coalesced around his candidacy early in the process.
Chesney, a Pennsylvania native, brings a background as an assistant coach on both defense and special teams. He has also developed a reputation as a turnaround artist, as he has resuscitated struggling programs at Division III Salve Regina, Division II Assumption University and turned FCS Holy Cross into a high-level winner. Along with being 20-5 at JMU, he's 131-51 overall as a college head coach over 16 seasons. At Holy Cross, he led the school to four of the six FCS Playoff appearances in school history, reaching four in a row from 2019-22. He led them to five Patriot League titles.
UCLA's courtship has been a long one, as they fired coach DeShaun Foster in mid-September after an
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