Phil Longo was fired as the college football coach at Sam Houston State after just 20 games. Former Bearkats running back Shane Porter, who quit the team during the fired head coach’s first season, is vindicated for taking a parting shot at the program.
His frustration was more than valid.
Porter’s brief time in Huntsville was so awful that he decided to give up his college football career all together. He would rather not play at all than play for Longo.
Phil Longo was fired.
It took less than two full seasons for Phil Longo to be relieved of his duties as the head football coach at Sam Houston State University. The 58-year-old was officially fired on Wednesday after a 1-7 start to the season.
The Bearkats won only three of their last 20 games. Their only wins were against a floundering Oregon State program and a bowl-eligible Delaware program in 2025, and an FCS program in 2026. Only the win over the Blue Hens was impressive.
Longo was hired in December of 2024 as a head coach for the first time sine 2005. He took over at Sam Houston State after stints as the offensive coordinator at Ole Miss, North Carolina and Wisconsin— and an extremely successful stint as the offensive coordinator at Sam Houston on the FCS level from 2014-2016. His return to Huntsville was not.
The Bearkats went 10-3 in 2024 and won the New Orleans Bowl. Longo finished 3-17 in less than two seasons, with only one conference win and two FBS wins. He did not make a bowl game, obviously. He did win a single game at the brand-new stadium on campus. His offense was one of the worst in the FBS in both seasons.
Although it makes sense for Sam Houston State to move on from Longoball, the timing was a bit of a surprise. I kind of expected the school to wait until the end of the season. It ultimately decided that he was causing irreparable harm to the program with each passing day and decided to cut him loose with four games still remaining in the regular season. The time for change is now.
Shane Porter quit football all together because of his time at Sam Houston State.
Winning cures everything and Phil Longo did not win. Meanwhile, he also destroyed the culture of the program and absolutely nobody showed up to games. A disastrous first-hand account of his first season at the helm gave a behind-the-scenes look at his coaching style. He did not make good on his promises, rarely showed up on time to practice and often skipped out on meetings. Players were already sick and tired of playing for him in October of his first year.
Snapback Sports partnered with Sam Houston State in 2026. It is the official jersey sponsor for the Bearkats.
CEO and founder Jack Settleman said on Wednesday that he “wouldn’t have done the patch again with this head coach, for a multitude of reasons.” The main reason was that he wanted the head coach, Longo, to be more involved with the media. Snapback Sports never spoke with Longo. Whereas, men’s basketball coach Chris Mudge spoke at length with Settleman and his coworkers.
And then there is Shane Porter. Porter, who has more than 1.3 million followers on TikTok, was a highly-coveted running back in the transfer portal during the 2024-2025 offseason. He chose to play for Longo at Sam Houston State. He left the team after six-straight losses to begin the 2025 season, which marked the end of his college football career.
Porter said he made the “worst decision ever” to play for the Bearkats. His post on Snapchat went extremely viral. Some people accused him of being salty because he did not play. Others said that he was upset with a lack of NIL payments.
You can read Porter’s full account of what happened here. The ouster of Longo on Wednesday proves that he was valid in his criticism. He wishes that his final year of college football would’ve gone differently. The fired head coach is largely to blame.