Hazell is a coach I find fascinating because he was a sign of how we approach the assessment hiring of small school coaches and extending big school coaches so incorrectly.
Yeah, it was not a good stretch. The previous AD, Morgan Burke, and the university Presidents he worked under, were not the ones who wanted to join the "college football arms race". Burke did a lot of good--he hired Tiller, Painter, he did a lot for the non-revenue sports and facilities, but it was clear that spending with the big boys on football wasn't his thing.
Purdue tried to follow the Alvarez->Bielema "HC in waiting" thing. They'd done it successfully with Keady and Painter, and then tried to do it with Tiller and Hope. They were able to snag Hope for bargain-basement prices because he had no better options, but he'd had previous success as our OL coach, and Tiller wanted him.
Well, Hope failed. Against weak OOC competition including yearly FCS schools, he was able to put together somewhat middling records and the fan base was livid because we were getting discount results which we attributed to paying discount prices.
When Hazell was hired, Burke finally "opened the pocketbook" which made fans happy. He had only been a HC for two years, but actually taking Kent State to a bowl game was something to point to as a rising "up and comer". I was openly critical of the hire on one sense though--he was a Tressel disciple and I wasn't sure he'd figure out how to win with Tressel methods and a Purdue talent level. But I was also willing to give him the chance to prove me wrong. And for all the damage he did to the program on the field (and via recruiting), one thing I'll say about Hazell is he was an exemplary face of the program off it.
But he couldn't recruit, and the results on the field were quite literally the worst in Purdue's history. The talent hole he dug left a huge task for Brohm, and it's taken years for him to actually get this roster to a competitive level.
