West Virginia football: Bob Simmons to join the staff?

Could Bob Simmons be back in the Big 12 soon? West Virginia has a staff opening, Simmons had eight good years on Don Nehlen’s staff in the 1980s and Simmons would like to get back into college football.

Simmons, OSU’s head coach from 1995 through 2001, told me Sunday night he has talked with West Virginia people about returning to the staff. Simmons said he hasn’t spoken with head coach Dana Holgorsen yet but hopes to.

“I would like to” return to West Virginia, Simmons said. “It’d be great. I hope it happens.”

Simmons coached all-American linebacker Darryl Talley at West Virginia in the ’80s. Simmons was on the Mountaineer staff when Oliver Luck quarterbacked West Virginia. Luck now is WVU’s athletic director.

Simmons would add to a heavy Oklahoma State tint in Morgantown. Holgorsen came from OSU, where he was Mike Gundy’s offensive coordinator in 2010. Holgorsen in January hired away Joe DeForest, OSU’s longest-serving assistant coach.

West Virginia joins the Big 12 this summer. The Mountaineers apparently will play in Stillwater in the 2012 season.

Simmons, 62, coached at Bowling Green in 1976 and Toledo in 1977-79 before joining Nehlen’s West Virginia staff from 1980-87. Simmons then went to Colorado with Bill McCartney, coaching seven years, before getting the OSU job. After leaving OSU, Simmons sat out a season, then coached six years for Tyrone Willingham, three at Notre Dame and three at Washington.

Simmons now lives in the Denver area.