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Gary Patterson is out at TCU.

TCU coach Gary Patterson out after 21 seasons; Jerry Kill named interim coach

By Sam Khan Jr. and Bruce Feldman, The Athletic

TCU and coach Gary Patterson have parted ways effective immediately, the school said Sunday. Jerry Kill will serve as interim coach. Patterson informed the team earlier today, according to a source.

Patterson was fired, sources say. This week, athletic director Jeremiah Donati wanted to see what changes Patterson was going to make in the offseason, but didn’t like Patterson's solutions, and the situation went downhill. Donati wanted Patterson to stay on the rest of the season, per sources, but Patterson said he was done now.

Patterson, in his 21st season as Horned Frogs head coach, was the second-longest tenured head coach in FBS. In a statement, Donati said he and chancellor Victor Boschini met with Patterson on Sunday and asked him to coach the remainder of the season and take on a different role in 2022, but Patterson believed it was "in the team and TCU's best interests" to transition out of the position immediately.

The 61-year-old was 181-79 at TCU and 3-5 in 2021. The Horned Frogs have lost three consecutive games by double digits, including a 31-12 loss to Kansas State on Saturday.

TCU won double-digit games 11 times under Patterson, including a 13-0 season in 2010 that ended with a Rose Bowl win and No. 2 ranking in the final AP poll. The Horned Frogs nearly made the College Football Playoff in its first season in 2014, going 12-1 but finishing fifth in the final ranking.

The team reached the Big 12 championship game in 2017, losing to Oklahoma, but hasn’t finished better than fifth in the conference over the past three seasons. TCU hasn’t been ranked in the AP poll since September 2019.

Patterson coached the Horned Frogs in four different conferences: the WAC (for one game as an interim coach in 2000), Conference USA (2001-04), the Mountain West (2005-11) and the Big 12 (2012-present).

TCU unveiled a statue of Patterson outside Amon G. Carter Stadium in 2016.

"The story of Gary Patterson and the rise in the fortunes of the TCU football program over the last 20 years is clearly one of the most remarkable in the history of college football," Donati said in a statement. "We are grateful to Gary and Kelsey Patterson and appreciate everything they have meant to TCU and the Fort Worth community. Under his leadership, TCU has become a nationally recognized brand name in football and in collegiate athletics."

What is Patterson’s legacy at TCU?

Sam Khan Jr., senior college football writer: Football success under Patterson forever changed TCU. The school was left out of the initial formation of the Big 12 following the Southwest Conference’s dissolution in 1995 and in danger of being forever relegated to the college football wilderness. But Patterson turned TCU into a consistent winner and a financial commitment to football followed.

TCU won 10-plus games eight times in Patterson's first 11 years, including a Rose Bowl victory, that paved the way for a Big 12 invitation in 2012. Amon G. Carter Stadium and the team’s football complex are pristine, renovations largely resulting from Patterson’s football success.

How good of a job is TCU?

Khan: Even in a weakened Big 12 minus Oklahoma and Texas, this is a good job. Fort Worth is a great location, it’s in a prime recruiting footprint (the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is one of the most fertile recruiting grounds in the country, plus it’s not terribly far from talent-rich East Texas) and TCU has plenty of financial resources. They paid Patterson handsomely and have deep-pocketed donors who have footed the bill for numerous upgrades.

It might be the most attractive job in the new Big 12.

It will be interesting to see if Patterson will try to get another HFC gig.

This surprises me, I figured he's stay there as long as he wanted.

Yeah, perhaps he had a clash with the AD/President about something, or the Big Donors if they have some wanted him gone.

Maybe he was just tired of it all, 21 years of sucking up to high school kids?  I couldn't do it.

I’ve heard that he’s a giant douche bag. A Grade asshole is the words I remember. But when you’re winning, all is forgiven. 

TCU is a joke anyways. They were let into the Big 12 based on ~10 years of overachieving in No mans land. In the 10 years since they have failed to win at least 9 games 7 out of ten years. The other three years they have done good, winning 11 games twice and 12 games once, the infamous One True Champion year. 

The other two 11 win seasons they got beat like a drum bu OU, twice in the last case. 

They’re about to find out what it means to wander the desert, they’re only successful because Patterson put them there against weaker competition. The only difference between them and the other G5 schools is that all the other successful G5 schools lost their coach after 2 successful years. It’s happened to UH and SMU multiple times with Sumlin, Herman, etc. 

Vandy would be very happy with those numbers.  Very.

He's around .500 with one outlying year to the good.  

No, I did in fact mention those 11 and 12 year wins in my post. I only included the last 5 years because at any other name school that’s all that counts. 

It’s been 10 years in the “New and Worse” Big 12 and TCU either has a losing record or right at .500 overall. With no Nebraska or Colorado or A&M and UT during their worst ~ 10 year stretch of the last half century or more.