The New York Giants reportedly are interviewing Joe Judge for their head coach opening Monday.
But they may have competition from Judge's alma mater.
The New England Patriots' special teams coordinator and wide receivers coach is a "strong candidate" to take Mississippi State's head coach job, The Athletic's Bruce Feldman reported Monday.
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Judge played quarterback at Mississippi State from 2000 to 2004 and began his coaching career with the Bulldogs as a graduate assistant from 2005 to 2007. He also spent three years at Alabama on the staff of Nick Saban -- a close friend of Bill Belichick -- before joining the Patriots as a special teams assistant in 2012.
As Feldman wrote late last week, Judge long has coveted the chance to coach at Mississippi State and now has the chance after the school fired head coach Joe Moorhead on Friday.
"I’m hearing he has always REALLY wanted this job and that he will have the support of some key folks at Mississippi State," Feldman wrote.
New England Patriots
If Judge takes either the Giants or Mississippi State job, he'll leave the Patriots with two vacancies to fill on their coaching staff. The 37-year-old has been New England's special teams coordinator since 2015, and the team's assistant special teams coach, Cameron Achord, just finished his second season with the Patriots.
Judge took over the wide receivers coach job in 2019 from Chad O'Shea, who left to become the Miami Dolphins' offensive coordinator but was fired last week after just one season.
UPDATE (Tuesday, Jan. 7, 11:30 a.m. ET): Judge won't be heading to his alma mater, after all.
The New York Giants are hiring Judge as their next head coach, according to multiple reports Tuesday morning.