Mangino named new Kansas football coach

<br>LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) _ Mark Mangino, who helped mold Oklahoma's national championship team last year, was named Tuesday as head coach at Kansas. <br><br>Mangino, the Sooners' offensive coordinator,

Tuesday, December 4th 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) _ Mark Mangino, who helped mold Oklahoma's national championship team last year, was named Tuesday as head coach at Kansas.

Mangino, the Sooners' offensive coordinator, will take over for Terry Allen, who was fired with three games left in his fifth straight losing season. The Jayhawks have had six losing years in a row and have been wholly ineffective in the rugged Big 12 competition.

``I'm extremely excited about being here at the University of Kansas,'' Mangino said at an afternoon news conference on the campus. ``It's a great time to be here at KU.''

Just two days earlier, Mangino, 45, had issued a statement that he was withdrawing from consideration.

Before joining head coach Bob Stoops at Oklahoma three years ago, Mangino was an assistant coach for eight years at Kansas State. He said Tuesday returning to Kansas is like ``coming back home.''

``Mark is a very good hire for the University of Kansas. He is very intelligent and a good worker,'' Kansas State football coach Bill Snyder said in a statement.

Known as a standout recruiter, Mangino was the Sooners' offensive coordinator the past two years.

``Mark is a very disciplined and thorough coach who has the fire and the emotion you need to motivate a team,'' said Stoops.

Athletic director Al Bohl, who was hired last summer specifically to get the football program turned around, fired Allen on Nov. 4 with three games remaining and replaced him with interim head coach Tom Hayes. The Jayhawks finished 3-8, losing 59-0 to Texas and 49-7 to Iowa State under Hayes before closing out with a 27-14 win over Wyoming. Their only victory in the Big 12 was over Texas Tech.

Mangino is stepping into a pressure-laden situation. Bohl has bragged that he will build Kansas into a national power that supplants Kansas State as No. 1 program in the state.

A year ago, Mangino won the Frank Broyles award as the nation's best assistant football coach.

A native of New Castle, Pa., he went to college at Youngstown State University in Ohio.

Brooks Barta, a former Kansas State linebacker who now coaches at Holton High School, remembers Mangino as a personable and capable coach and effective recruiter.

``I think he has great organizational skills and great people skills,'' he said. ``He was the recruiting coordinator when I was there and he did a good job because he could organize those things and make connections with people. He's got kind of a bright and energetic personality, and he's real positive.''