It would appear that the first wave of interviews will end today or perhaps tomorrow. Sal Sunseri was supposed to be the last candidate interviewed. Now it appears, though, that Long will interview one more candidate — Randy Shannon, the defensive coordinator for the Miami Hurricanes. Why? Sadly, it looks to be for appearances:

Sources have said that Long indicated he would like to interview at least two minority candidates for the job. He met with New York Giants coordinator Tim Lewis Friday; Shannon would be the second minority candidate if the two were to meet. Long has been in close contact with the Black Coaches Association throughout the interview process.

Amusing sidenote, Tim Lewis’ agent is Walt Harris’ former agent, Bob LaMonte. You know, the guy who called out the Pitt administration during the season for a contract extension. That would be an interesting meeting.

As for Lewis, it now seems as if it wasn’t much of an official interview.

Giants defensive coordinator Tim Lewis met with University of Pittsburgh athletic director Jeff Long on Friday to discuss the school’s vacant head coaching job, though it was apparently an “informal” interview and Tom Coughlin did not know it was taking place.

Coughlin denied yesterday that Lewis interviewed for the Pitt job and insisted that no one from the school had contacted anyone in the Giants organization to request permission to speak to Lewis. “I don’t think that anyone in the organization would take a phone call and not let me know about it,” Coughlin said.
…
However, Giants sources described the meeting as “preliminary talk – not an official interview,” and one source added that Lewis informed Coughlin as soon as the meeting was over. Lewis and Coughlin had previously discussed the possibility that Lewis would be a candidate at Pitt, and the two spoke again about the subject yesterday.

Apparently Lewis – who is not allowed by Coughlin to speak to the media – told Long that if they wanted to meet again, Long would have to ask the Giants for permission. Giants GM Ernie Accorsi said no one from Pitt has contacted him. Lewis, who turned 43 Saturday, was a star cornerback for Pitt from 1979-82.

Apparently Coughlin had given permission for Lewis to meet informally with Pitt without prior notice — if it happened in New Jersey.

As for Pelini, he is still considered the leading candidate for the job. Oklahoma isn’t worried one way or another now. This past weekend was the last chance to recruit for a couple weeks. Right now recruiting is in an NCAA mandated “dead period” where coaches cannot have any contact with recruits.

This helps explain why Pitt wants to get their guy this or next week. Give them chance to put together a staff, and even a gameplan; look over who their commits are/were; prepare to contact the present commits, reassure, and go hard after some others; introduce themselves to area coaches; and all the while other schools’ coaches are doing nothing.

A column wondering how it came to be that coaches are actually turning down jobs with seeming regularity. Last I checked it was called market forces. Look into it.