Florida State coach Jimbo Fisher 'not talking' about LSU job

ByJARED SHANKER
September 26, 2016, 3:20 PM

— -- TALLAHASSEE, Fla. -- Florida State coach Jimbo Fisher said he has not had contact with LSU and his focus is on upcoming opponent North Carolina.

LSU fired Les Miles on Sunday, and Fisher is expected to be one of LSU's targets. He was rumored to be a priority target for LSU last season when Miles' status was in limbo late in the year.

"I'm not talking about LSU. No I haven't [had contact] and I'm not talking about it," Fisher said, "We're talking about North Carolina."

An LSU assistant beginning in 2000 with Nick Saban, Fisher won a national championship as the Tigers' offensive coordinator in 2003. When Miles followed Saban in 2005, Fisher remained on staff before leaving to become the offensive coordinator and head-coach-in-waiting at Florida State in 2007.

Fisher won a national championship at Florida State in 2013 and has 71-15 career record with three ACC titles. The No. 12 Seminoles are 3-1 this season.

As an assistant and head coach, he has tutored four first-round quarterbacks, a position the Tigers struggled to develop under Miles once Fisher left.

Fisher, in his seventh season at Florida State, said his focus is on coaching, and he isn't interested in listening to overtures from other schools.

"I'm coaching football," said Fisher, who added he doesn't tell his representation how to handle interest from other schools but not to "accept anything, don't talk anything, don't do anything."

Houston coach Tom Herman, also considered an early LSU target, told the Houston Chronicle "nobody has contacted me."

In addition, when asked about the LSU job by reporters, Louisville coach Bobby Petrino said he isn't "interesting going anywhere."

After several high-profile programs dismissed head and assistant coaches Sunday, Fisher said it's a "shame college football is getting to that now."

"I think it's the first sign of the [College Football] Playoff," he said. "They're trying to turn it into pro football. If you start turning it into pro football, you better be careful what you ask for. Are you saying the season is over if a team doesn't go to the playoff? If I can't get in the playoff, a team tanks? You guys write the season is over if a team doesn't go to the playoffs.

"... I'm talking about the big picture of this game. There's a lot of things we all want, but at the end we're not looking at the big picture and how it affects the game itself and the integrity of the game besides winning a championship, which we all want and I'm as competitive as any human being out there. But think about the big picture of what you want to do -- not next year but five, 10, 15, 20 years down the road."

Alabama coach Nick Saban agreed with Fisher.

"This is very similar to Georgia firing Mark Richt when he averages 10 wins a season," Saban said. "I guess this is the time that we live in. Everybody needs to know that. But it doesn't minimize to any degree the amount of respect that we have for the job that Les Miles did at LSU and the great competitive teams that he's had there for a long, long time and the amount of success that he's had."

ESPN's Andrea Adelson and Greg Ostendorf contributed to this report