Update >> Coastal has now announced Beck has been let go, and defensive coordinator Jeremiah Johnson will serve as interim head coach for the upcoming bowl game.
On the heels of a three-game losing streak capping off a 6-6 season, Coastal Carolina is set to part ways with third-year head coach Tim Beck, several sources tell FootballScoop.
Bech has positioned the Chanticleers for a third bowl berth in as many seasons, but he’s also now just 20-18 overall atop the Conway, South Carolina, program.
Worse, when Coastal Carolina lost games this season, it tended to do so in blowout-fashion. The Chanticleers dropped their final two games against South Carolina and James Madison by a combined 110-17 margin.
Additionally, five of Coastal’s six losses were by 38 or more points; the only tight setback was a 45-40 defeat to Clay Helton’s scuffling Georgia Southern program.
The Chanticleers had called a 12:30 p.m. ET staff meeting, when it will be announced who will serve as the program’s interim coach and that the school is embarking on its second search in less than three calendar years. Beck was hired Dec. 4, 2022, to replace Jamey Chadwell after Chadwell bounced from the program to take over at Liberty for Hugh Freeze, who had departed to take over at Auburn.
Freeze also was fired in this cycle when Auburn dismissed him earlier this month.
Coastal won eight games in 2023, Beck’s debut campaign and his first-ever season as a collegiate head coach following more than 30 years as an assistant at programs ranging from Nebraska to Ohio State to Texas, among others.
But even in that season, Beck’s charges established their tendency of losing in oftentimes non-competitive settings.
Of Beck’s 18 losses atop the Coastal program, 15 of them were by double digits and nine were by 20 or more points.
Coastal also has fallen markedly behind would-be rival James Madison, which crushed the Chanticleers 59-10 in Saturday’s regular-season finale.
The Dukes won their three meetings against Beck by a combined 154-31.
Sources tell FootballScoop that South Carolina defensive coordinator Clayton White is an early name to watch in the Coastal Carolina search; he and Coastal Carolina Athletics Director Chance Miller previously worked for nearly three years together at South Carolina.
