We heard last week that Northern Illinois coach and my personal favorite for the Purdue job, Dave Doeren, might have been out of the running. Well, we know it for sure now. The North Carolina State Wolfpack have swooped in and stolen Dave Doeren from us, hiring him this afternoon:

Both local and national outlets are reporting Northern Illinois head coach Dave Doeren will be the next head coach at N.C. State. Doeren's NIU team just won the MAC championship Friday night, giving itself a slight chance of a BCS at-large bid, though that likely went out the window with Oklahoma's win on Saturday.

With Doeren out that leaves Butch Jones, who reportedly has a Purdue offer on the table, as the leading candidate by an even wider margin. He has a 14-10 lead over Connecticut at the moment and a victory gives the Bearcats a share of the Big East title.

Aside from Jones, there are plenty of guess, but no concrete evidence on who has been reached. The name of Dykes, Hazell, Mangino, and others have been thrown around. I think Dykes, who interviewed with NC State, could very well be higher on the list than we thought, but hasn't gotten a lot of mention because of his interview at NC State.

Let us not forget that the SEC schools of Arkansas, Auburn, and Tennessee have yet to make an official move too.