I think that when the right opportunity presents itself, Smart will be ready. At the moment, he appears to enjoy his role and he's gaining invaluable mentorship from the best coach in college football. There are flaws with all of the openings at the moment:
While the Florida gig wasn't perhaps the complete ideal situation (having recruited years of spread option personnel) for a coach that believes in ball control offense, Muschamp had been somewhat frustrated at Texas after being named coach in waiting and then realizing that Mack Brown was not going to leave anytime soon. Florida is still in the hotbed of recruiting and Muschamp had to be confident that he could keep Florida at a competitive level primarily based on the availability of talent. Muschamp might have taken a lesser opportunity to get out of his hopeless situation at Texas.
There's no opportunity remotely comparable to Florida for Smart this year and since he seems to enjoy working with Saban, he's pursuing the correct path in biding his time. If Richt continues to underwhelm in big games and show non-chalance in his team discipline, the Georgia job might be available in the next couple of seasons.
- Auburn is possibly facing NCAA penalties and I also doubt that Smart wants to face Saban as the coach of his primary rival. It's also well documented that boosters exert undue influence over that program and that should be concerning to any candidate for that position.
- Tennessee is in turmoil and shares a conference division with three rivals (Georgia, Florida, South Carolina) that are playing at a very high level along with an in-state rival (Vanderbilt) that is beginning to pick up steam. Tennessee gets decent talent most of the time and has a winning tradition over the years, but it seems to be falling further behind the remainder of the division. It doesn't sound like an award-winning situation for a first-time job.
- Kentucky only cares about basketball... enough said.
- Arkansas is another situation where turmoil seems to have a favored seat at the table. Houston Nutt had fans snooping through his phone records and then his replacement goes easy riding with his engaged (not to him) subordinate and mistress. This is probably the best situation of the four openings in the SEC, but it still has to face Bama and LSU on an annual basis and that's quite a hurdle to face.
While the Florida gig wasn't perhaps the complete ideal situation (having recruited years of spread option personnel) for a coach that believes in ball control offense, Muschamp had been somewhat frustrated at Texas after being named coach in waiting and then realizing that Mack Brown was not going to leave anytime soon. Florida is still in the hotbed of recruiting and Muschamp had to be confident that he could keep Florida at a competitive level primarily based on the availability of talent. Muschamp might have taken a lesser opportunity to get out of his hopeless situation at Texas.
There's no opportunity remotely comparable to Florida for Smart this year and since he seems to enjoy working with Saban, he's pursuing the correct path in biding his time. If Richt continues to underwhelm in big games and show non-chalance in his team discipline, the Georgia job might be available in the next couple of seasons.