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Central Michigan football head coach Jim McElwain has decided to retire amid drama surrounding Michigan football staffer Connor Stalions. The NCAA is investigating McElwain and the Chippewas after a man that looked suspiciously similar to Stalions was on their sideline during a game against Michigan State last season.
“Central Michigan coach Jim McElwain is retiring, sources told CBS Sports,” A report from CBS stated. “The 62-year-old is ending a 40-year career that included coaching stops at Colorado State and Florida before his run at Central Michigan. The Chippewas, 4-7, end the season Nov. 30 at Northern Illinois.”
Jim McElwain has been at the head coach at Central Michigan since 2019, and he is now calling it a career.
The NCAA began investigating McElwain within the past couple weeks after the situation that transpired at Michigan State last season. At the time, Stalions was on the Michigan football staff and Central Michigan was playing at Michigan State on the Friday before the Wolverines opened their season. At this point, the college football world had no idea who Stalions was.
A couple months later, news broke that the Michigan football team was under investigation by the NCAA. The investigation was surrounding Stalions and his sign-stealing scheme. Shortly after the news broke, an image began circulating on social media of a man in Central Michigan gear on the Chippewas' sideline during that early season game against Michigan State. The man looked a lot like Stalions.
The interesting part of the story is that Central Michigan was never able to come out and identify the man on the sidelines. Had it been someone on their staff, they likely would've immediately released some sort of statement saying who it was, and the rumors would've ended there. Most people believe that it was Stalions.
Connor Stalions began working with the Michigan football team long before he was an actual paid staffer. Stalions started volunteering with the program in 2015. Jim McElwain was actually on the staff in 2018 as the wide receivers coach, and he could've gotten to know Stalions during that season.
McElwain has talked about what happened and he said that he wasn't aware of Stalions being on his sideline.
“We … were totally unaware of it,” McElwain said, according to an article from CBS. “I certainly don't condone it in any way, shape, or form, and I do know that his name was on none of the [sideline] passes that were let out.”
This investigation hasn't been going on for very long and it will be interesting to see what the NCAA finds. At this point, it seems extremely likely that it was indeed Stalions, but the question is whether or not Jim McElwain was involved or if anyone else within the Central Michigan football program was involved.
According to the report from CBS, McElwain made the decision to retire on his own, so it doesn't seem like this is something that was forced upon him by Central Michigan because of the investigation.
McElwain has been coaching since 1985 in both college and the NFL. He has had a lot of gigs, and he has been the head coach at Colorado State, Florida and Central Michigan.
