Two former Louisville assistants are going to Illinois to work under Ron Zook.

Paul Petrino -- who was his brother Bobby's offensive coordinator with the Cardinals before holding the same post at Arkansas -- will be Zook's playcaller. Longtime Louisville assistant Greg Nord will join him as tight ends coach. UPDATE: And former Louisville quarterbacks coach/offensive coordinator Jeff Brohm will be hired as the Illinois QB coach, according to Bruce Feldman. Nord, Petrino and Brohm were all on staff for the 2007 Louisville Orange Bowl team.

Paul Petrino badly wanted the Louisville head coaching job when his brother left for the NFL's Atlanta Falcons in January 2007. He did get interviewed by athletic director Tom Jurich but probably had no real chance because of some of the ill feelings left by Bobby's constant job flirtations. It's fun to speculate what kind of job Paul Petrino would have done with the Cardinals and whether he would have made a better choice than Steve Kragthorpe, who just got fired after three straight non-winning seasons.

Paul Petrino needed to get out of his brother's shadows, especially since Bobby calls the plays. It's an interesting parallel to the current situation at Cincinnati, where Jeff Quinn is the interim coach after being Brian Kelly's offensive coordinator. But though Quinn wants the job, he may be hurt by the fact that Kelly was viewed as the offensive mastermind and perhaps because of some lingering resentment about Kelly's departure.

Nord had been on the Louisville staff so long that he was an institution. He first signed on as an assistant in 1995 and coached under Ron Cooper, John L. Smith, Petrino and Kragthorpe. He also served as recruiting coordinator and had valuable ties inside the state of Kentucky. But it looks like new head coach Charlie Strong will bring in an entirely new staff as he tries to rebuild the Cardinals program.