STATESBORO — Georgia Southern Director of Athletics Tom Kleinlein announced Sunday that assistant head coach Dell McGee has been tabbed as the Eagles' interim head coach for the upcoming GoDaddy Bowl against Bowling Green, according to gseagles.com.

McGee takes over for Willie Fritz, who accepted the head coaching position at Tulane last week.

"Coach Fritz and I had a conversation when he came back from New York. and we talked about the future and leadership of our program," Kleinlein said. "Coach felt there may be some distractions associated with him being the head coach and didn't want to detract from the experience of going to a bowl for our players. We thought it would be good for Dell McGee to take over and would be good for his career to take over moving forward, so I have officially named him the interim head coach moving forward."

Kleinlein and McGee both announced that the entire remaining coaching staff will remain in place for the bowl game.

"I'm honored that Tom Kleinlein has the faith in me to lead this program for the GoDaddy Bowl," McGee said. "Our main goal is to prepare our kids for the bowl game as we look forward to Georgia Southern experiencing its first bowl game. I'm privileged to be leading this group of players and coaches and we're going to try and keep everything the same for these next 10 days. The plan that's in place is a great plan, and it will continue."

The GoDaddy Bowl is at 7 p.m. Dec. 23 in Mobile, Alabama.