Get ready to ring those cowbells

A new era of McNeese State football was ushered in on Friday.

In front of a packed EndZone Club in the Jack V. Doland Fieldhouse, Sterlin Gilbert was introduced as the next Cowboys head coach, the sixth in the history of the program.

Both school President Dr. Daryl Burckel and Athletic Director Bruce Hemphill spoke briefly to a crowd of media, boosters, fans and others before introducing Gilbert to a round of applause.

“The most attractive candidate, coach Gilbert, is our first choice,” Hemphill said prior to introducing Gilbert. “And our choice parallels the McNeese vision and mission to change lives. His coaching experience and success is what drew us to him along with his focus to develop young men on and off the field.”

Wearing a navy-blue suit with a white dress and yellow-patterned tie, Gilbert spoke to the crowd for a few minutes without answering questions and covered a variety of subjects. He promised, “An exciting brand of football,” would be brought to McNeese.

“We’re going to be extremely explosive on offense,” Gilbert said. “We’re going to be extremely physical on defense; we’re going to play great and sound on special teams.”

He also mentioned taking advantage of Cowboy Stadium to create the home-field advantage that McNeese had come to be known for.

“Those cannons are going to be firing because we’re going to score points,” Gilbert said. “That’s a guarantee. We’re going to ring those cowbells. We’re going to be exciting. We’re going to put an exciting brand in front of you to give you a reason to show up every Saturday and continue to cheer on your Cowboys.”

On the recruiting front, Gilbert said he’s already been in contact with current McNeese commitments and he wants kids to sign with the Cowboys when the early signing period starts on Dec, 19, but only if they truly feel they want to.

As someone who coached high school football in Texas, Gilbert said he plans to use his high school coaching connections and heavily recruit Louisiana’s neighbor to the west. But he also said he plans to keep the home state a priority.

“I love being able to create new relationships with not only the players but the coaches and being able to recruit their kids,” Gilbert said. “I’m anxiously awaiting that as we get into next week and get out into the state of Louisiana and get into Texas and start recruiting the best student-athletes that we can to come to McNeese.”

After speaking to the crowd upstairs, Gilbert took time to for pictures and to speak with the boosters and fans before going downstairs to the team room for a news conference where he and Hemphill answered questions.

Among the issues raised was Gilbert’s rolling-stone movement. Since entering the college ranks as a full-time coach at Eastern Illinois, he’s been at five schools in seven seasons and never stayed at one school longer than two seasons.

When Hemphill was asked if he had any hesitancy about hiring Gilbert because of Gilbert’s lack of roots, he said no.

“We were looking for the best fit,” Hemphill said. “The best fit for now — along with the fact that he has been so successful with all of his offensive coordinator positions. And he’s been very popular with his players. So, as far as the future, that took no affect to us whatsoever. If people come calling, that means that we’ve chosen the right person.”

Burckel said Gilbert’s base salary will be $180,000, the same as former head coach Lance Guidry received at the end of his contract. That does not include bonuses, incentives or money that could be made from television, radio and camps, Burckel said.

“From what I understand, that was acceptable,” said Burckel, who added that he took a hands-off approach to the coaching search. “So we believe we had a competitive package.”

Gilbert confirmed that he will call the offensive plays, but he also plans to hire someone to possibly be a co-offensive coordinator. He said he wants to have the full coaching staff in by January, hopefully before the team gets back to campus to start the spring semester.

While he has not made any offers to coaches, Gilbert said that he’s close and that he’s received a lot of contact from coaches who want to join his staff. A day after cleaning house of assistant coaches, he did not completely rule out retaining coaches from McNeese’s staff last season.

His task of returning Mc-Neese into what fans want it to be is off to a fast start.