As of Saturday, Jeff Jagodzinski told the Boston Globe no one had contacted him about the New York Jets job: "[T]here's nothing to it. I haven't talked to them and no one has contacted me." As of Sunday night, Jagodzinski was not only set to interview with the Jets today, according to ESPN's Chris Mortensen, but Boston College athletic director Gene DeFilippo was planning to fire him if Jags goes through with it, back-to-back division championships be damned. As of this morning, prominent BC sites were reporting Jagodzinski is not in Boston, thanking the coach for his time and reviewing potential replacements.

So goes the first great staring contest of 2009. Either the ultimatum report is off-base here -- no one has the coach or AD on the record on this, but no one is doubting Mortensen, either -- or DeFilippo has DeFlipped out, according to his own constituents:

I don’t care if Jags had an iron-clad contract that forbid him from even watching an NFL game. The reality of the industry is that these contracts are rarely enforced and never successfully used as implements to block someone from taking another job (see Rich Rodriguez, see Bobby Petrino, etc.) Gene knows this. So Gene has choices when situations like this arise.

1. Renegotiate and give Jags more money
2. Let him talk and potentially walk

Instead he picked the nuclear option of an ultimatum. What good can come of that? You either lose your coach or keep him and have him resent you and the job. There is no coming back from an ultimatum.

Much ado for a boss whose team just blew a long bowl winning streak to Vanderbilt, but we are talking about a coach with deep pro connections who's 20-8 at Boston College, who surprised everyone by winning 11 games and a division title in his first year with a future NFL star under center and then surprised everyone by winning the division again with no such offensive stars in his second year. Pete Carroll has flirted with and pursued the pros on numerous occasions. Jim Harbaugh is flirting with the Raider job. Kirk Ferentz and Bob Stoops fend off rumors on an annual basis; they're back again as NFL heads roll, like clockwork. These are the kinds of coaches (you know, winners) that attract attention, and have the leverage to pursue them. None of them is in remote jeopardy of losing his current job. Given what they've built, or are in the process of building, that would be kind of crazy. Flirtation -- especially at Boston College, which (no offense, Eagles) is not a "destination job" -- is the price of success, the nature of the beast, etc.

But apparently DeFilippo has already tapped offensive coordinator Steve Logan, a successful boss at East Carolina in the nineties, as the obvious successor if Jags calls his bluff. All indications appear to be that he will -- it's hard to see an in-demand coach returning to take control of a team with his tail between his legs, on a short leash for everyone to see. In a purely Machiavellian sense, Logan is not a bad play for DeFilippo: He's a quality replacement, and is plausibly responsible for much of the Eagles' success his own self; his viability lowers Jagodzinski's immediate value to BC.

These are the scenarios, then, to follow throughout the day, or the next few days: Either Jags interviews, is fired, and quickly takes another job (if not the Jets job, then another NFL gig, probably, as an assistant) or he interviews and comes back with the upper hand in the athletic department. What, exactly, is supposed to stop him from interviewing? Loyalty? That usually only works if it goes both ways.

UPDATE, 3:08 p.m. ET All quiet on the BC front so far, other than DeFilippo insisting, "This has been Coach Jags' initiative" and exhorting frustrating reporters to "ask him." But he didn't deliver the standard "Jeff Jagodzinski is our coach" line, either, which likely means this thing is still in the air.