This assignment is a little different. Yet he wasn't backing away from the seeming all-or-nothingness of it. He said all the things you expected him to say.
"I'm honored to be here and humbled to be here," Golden said. "It's a tremendous time [to be here]. We've got the infrastructure, the power and the energy to get back to national prominence. It's time we put it all together. There's a tradition here of winning national championships. There is no other standard by which we'll be measured.
"That's the legacy. That's the way it was."
Golden replaces former Hurricanes linebacker Randy Shannon, who was fired after a 7-5 season and a 28-22 4-year run.
"It's the right time . . . [for him to] lead us back to the top of the college football world," athletic director Kirby Hocutt said. "He has a game plan to achieve excellence.
"Five years ago, he accepted one of the greatest challenges in all of college football. Now he's accepting one of the great opportunities in all college sports."
The expectations will be enormous. At Temple, it was about becoming relevant. On the east coast of South Florida, it's about not ending up in another Sun Bowl.
The one-time Penn State tight end won't change. He'll do all the same things he did at Temple, because it worked. Now it just has to work on a much larger stage.
He wasn't going to be a Temple lifer. That's not the way his profession works. He was auditioning for a moment like this from the time he became an Owl. It was a matter of when and where. So, now we know.
This time, a whole lot more people will be paying attention.
"This is the greatest brand in college football," Golden insisted. "My job is . . . to win championships. We have to be champions in the classroom, in the community and on the field. My commitment is to play the way Hurricanes play.
"We will return [to the glory days]."
