Ranking how all the new college football coaches did in 2023

Look at what David Braun walked into. He came to Northwestern in January to become their defensive coordinator after holding that title the last four years at North Dakota State. Then in July, he was thrust into the head-coaching job after Pat Fitzgerald was dismissed amid a hazing scandal within the program. Braun got the job in large part because he was the new guy and he couldn’t have been part of the allegations. He took a fractured program mired in scandal, pain and anger — and one that wasn’t any good before the allegations even came to light — and delivered the biggest turnaround in the country. Braun’s Wildcats went 7-5 just one season after a 1-11 debacle and did that all while the program was crumbling around him. He won the Big Ten’s Coach of the Year award despite technically being the interim coach until Northwestern gave him the full-time gig in mid-November. 

Louisville certainly won the coaching carousel. When Cincinnati hired Kenny Satterfield away from the Cardinals (something not many Louisville fans were sad about), the school was able to finally lure Jeff Brohm away from Purdue. Brohm, a Louisville native and quarterback for the school in the early 1990s, led the Cards to a 10-3 record and a berth in the ACC championship game. 

What can be said about Jamey Chadwell’s first season at Liberty other than it was wildly successful? Liberty finished the season 13-0 and as Conference USA champions and also earned a berth in a New Year’s Six bowl game, the Fiesta Bowl versus Oregon. Sure, the CUSA isn’t an elite conference but Chadwell is continuing his career of helming winning programs at the Group of 5 level and will soon find himself taking over a Power 5 program. 

Wow. I’m not going to lie: I was very skeptical of this hiring initially but UNLV hit it out of the park. Odom took a Rebels program that had won just seven games over the past three years and brought them nine wins and a spot in the Mountain West championship game. This is the Rebels’ first winning season since 2013 and just their second since 2001. Their nine wins is the most in Vegas since Randall Cunningham’s 1984 squad. Odom won the Mountain West Coach of the Year award and validated the school making him the highest-paid head coach in the conference. 

Alex Golesh took over a South Florida program that went 1-11 last season (and 4-29 over the last three years) and won six games and reached a bowl game this year, marking the second biggest wins turnaround in the FBS. Under Golesh, the Bulls won their first road game since 2019 and employed one of the fastest offenses in the nation. Ironically, their biggest moment on the national stage was in a game in which they scored just three points — the Bulls put a scare in Alabama before the Tide pulled out a 17-3 victory. 

Key led his alma mater to a 6-6 record and a bowl berth — the Yellow Jackets’ first since 2018. Georgia Tech finished 4th in the ACC, beating two ranked teams behind one of the nation’s most improved offenses (the Jackets’ 23 points against Georgia in the finale was the most the two-time defending national champs gave up during the regular season). Key has this program turning around, and with the ACC in quite a bit of flux they could become the 2024 version of Louisville. 

When Texas State won their sixth game of the season, new head coach G. J. Kinne jumped into the San Marcos River just like the graduates do. Why? Kinne just guided his Bobcats to their first-ever bowl game berth in program history. Since making the jump to the FBS in 2012, Texas State has had just one winning season (2014) — but they didn’t get a bid. Since that last winning season, the Bobcats haven’t won more than four games in a season and has lost at least 10 games three times. That changes this year with another 7-5 record and their first bowl berth. 

Well, the Tigers improved by one win in 2023 and reached a bowl game so the season had moderate success. They played Georgia well and had a win over Alabama in the Iron Bowl ripped away from them on a miracle 4th-and-31 conversion by the Tide. Those losses stung, but it does show signs of a program headed in the right direction. Auburn is a tough gig. There are always high expectations, a fickle fan base and your biggest rival has been the sport’s dynasty the last 15 years. But Freeze calmed down the program and has them focused on football.

Coach Prime may be the most difficult person to rank. On one hand, he brought a ton of attention and buzz to a program that had been forgotten nationally. The Buffaloes went from one win a year ago to four in 2023. For the first month of the season, networks were falling over themselves to get Colorado and their stars on their college football programming. Of course, that all faded as the Buffs lost eight of their last nine games of the season and faced the reality that even Coach Prime isn’t immune to the problems that most programs face. Sanders ultimately did what he was hired to do — breathe life into a middling program.

Fickell’s first season in Madison was, well… underwhelming. In a wide-open Big Ten West division, a midseason swoon kept the Badgers from competing for a spot in the Big Ten title game. Some of that was injuries — namely to quarterback Tanner Mordecai and running backs Braelon Allen and Chez Mellusi — and some was just a personnel fit to what Fickell and his coaching staff wanted to do. Remember that Fickell got off to a rough start at Cincinnati before turning it on and getting the Bearcats into the College Football Playoff. That will be a much more difficult task at Wisconsin, however, as the divisional format is gone after this season and the Big Ten adds Oregon, Washington, USC and UCLA. 

UAB, like the other former Conference USA schools that made the jump to the AAC, struggled a bit this season in their new atmosphere. The Blazers finished with a 4-8 mark, hampered by an awful defense and an inconsistent offense. UAB gave up nearly 37 points per game and opponents scored at least 41 points in four of the final six games. Dilfer was an outside-the-box hire, a former Super Bowl-winning quarterback who made the jump from coaching high school football to taking on a program that was shut down less than a decade ago and moving to what many feel is the best Group of Five conference. Sadly, Dilfer’s first season will be most remembered for his sideline tirade towards his assistant coaches in a loss to Tulane in September. 

It was going to take a lot of work and a lot of time to make Nebraska a solid program. Rhule was hired for his ability to turn programs around, as he did at Temple and Baylor. But remember, he won just two games in his first year with Temple and only one game in his Baylor debut, so with that context he’s done a decent job in Lincoln. The 2024 season will go a long way towards how the rebuild is going and Rhule has a history of identifying and solving those problems. Losing the final four games of the season doesn’t really pump up a fanbase that has been patiently waiting for success to come back to Lincoln. 

Newberry, a defensive specialist by trade, had an uneven first season at the helm of the United States Naval Academy. The Midshipmen were blown out by Notre Dame in Dublin, Ireland in their opener and gave up a lot of points in losses to SMU and South Florida. However, Navy recorded three shutouts this season, their most since 1978. He was an interesting hire to begin with and brings a level of calm and poise to a place that is known for its regimented lifestyle.  

Tom Herman’s career has been nomadic — not staying long at one place before moving on to a better situation. He reached his peak when he left Houston for Texas’ head-coaching job in 2017 but was dismissed after four seasons. His first year back in coaching since he was an analyst for the NFL’s Chicago Bears in 2021 was… meh. Florida Atlantic finished with a 4-8 record and lost five of their last six games (their lone win was over lowly Charlotte). The season showed some promise early on with a competitive loss at Illinois and a blowout win at South Florida before the late-season collapse put a damper on the campaign. FAU is a place where coaches go to rehabilitate their careers, as Lane Kiffin did successfully and Willie Taggart failed to do. Herman is determined to get the Owls back on track — but what will happen if he does?

Beck’s Chanticleers took a few steps back after a massively successful run by Jamey Chadwell (a guy we highlighted earlier). Chadwell went 31-6 over the last three years at Coastal Carolina and set a level of expectations for the program. Those expectations were not met as Beck’s bunch went 7-5 on the season during a bumpy year. After a solid showing in a loss at UCLA to begin the season, the Chanticleers were streaky — win two, lose two, win five straight, lose the final two games of the season. Granted, the ‘Cleers lost quarterback Grayson McCall to a head injury midseason (McCall has since entered the transfer portal) and Beck did his best to keep the team afloat. We will likely get a better gauge on Beck and his program next year as he replaces his star quarterback and builds his roster. A 7-5 season in Conway is a downer, but that says more about what this program has done of late.

Morris ushered in the Mean Green into the AAC this season and received uneven results. For example, North Texas went on a four-game losing skid late in the season before winning their final two games and earning a 5-7 record. Morris has some momentum heading into the offseason and believe they’ve found their quarterback in Chandler Rogers. Morris needs to find talent on defense — the unit was last in the AAC in yards and scoring.

Taylor’s Cardinal went from one win to three in a very good Pac-12 this season. Sure, Stanford was completely dismantled in a few games, but they did pop Colorado while the shine was still on the Buffs and played Arizona and Washington close before losing. Taylor took over a very inexperienced roster and doesn’t have the ability to grab just anybody off the transfer portal. This season was a building block as the Cardinal will enter the ACC next season. 

The good? Western Michigan did beat both of their rivals — Central Michigan and Eastern Michigan. The bad? They pretty much couldn’t beat anybody else. The Broncos finished 4-8 on the season and tied for last place in the MAC West Division. Taylor’s team had two three-game losing streaks this season and ended the year losing their final two games by a combined total of 58-10. Taylor loves running the football and found himself a stud in freshman Jalen Buckley, who won MAC Freshman of the Year, to build his offense around. If Taylor is able to built out his roster the way he wants, the 2024 season could see Western Michigan back in a bowl. 

Taking over a program that was rife with scandal is always tough and Kenny Dillingham experienced that in his first season at Arizona State. A lot of Dillingham’s job was getting fans back and caring about a program they were, frankly, disgusted at. He’s worked at selling the program back to the fanbase as well as creating relationships with local high schools and prominent folks in the community. On the field it has been a work in progress. The Sun Devils finished just 3-9, but did get a late season win at UCLA. The Pac-12 was tough this season and the Sun Devils offense was lacking talent and depth (they scored over 24 points just twice this season), but we saw how rival Arizona was able to take a rough start to the Jedd Fisch era and turn it into a 9-3 team in a couple years. Dillingham will have the challenging of moving to the Big 12 next year so a lot of work needs to be done this offseason.

Walters is a defensive guy, so changing the culture at Purdue — who has been known as an offensive-minded program — was going to take some time. The Boilermakers offense was awful for most of the season, scoring 17 points or less six times this season (all of which were in Big Ten play). They did show some life late, scoring 49 points on Minnesota and 35 on Indiana — both wins — but the defense was lacking all year. Purdue gave up 32.8 ppg over their final six games of the season. There were also off-field moments from Walters, most notably his openness in commenting on Michigan’s sign-stealing scandal and his distaste for Nebraska.  

Tulsa won just four games this season, one less than last year. The Golden Hurricane lost six of their final seven games with the lone win coming over 2-10 East Carolina in the finale. Though Tulsa was blown out several times, they lost a few close games down the stretch before beating ECU. The offensive guru has some work to do to get Tulsa’s offense going and looks to have a busy offseason adding more talent.  

Honestly, Satterfield walked into this job with the cards stacked against him. He was replacing arguably the most successful coach in Bearcats history just as the program was moving to the Big 12. He wasn’t an inspiring hire to begin with, and a 3-9 season that ended with blowout losses to West Virginia and Kansas certainly doesn’t change that perception. The Cats went 1-8 in their first Big 12 season with the lone win coming over fellow newcomer Houston. This was a program with a tremendous amount of momentum going over the last five years, and Satterfield needs to get Cincinnati back on track. 

There were a couple highs during a season of mostly lows for Bill Poggi and his sleeveless sweatshirts. The 49ers defense was relatively decent and kept Charlotte in several games, but ultimately failed due to an unimaginative offense. One positive was how Charlotte went up early on Maryland in a nationally televised game, but that positive turned upside down as the Terps surged ahead for the win. Poggi came into the season with a lot of talk that went nowhere. He is saying he recognizes the mistakes he has made and looks to correct them in ’24. He will need to. Poggi was an unorthodox hire that was meant to inject life into a program that has struggled to get off the ground. Year One didn’t show much so next season will need to show a lot of progress.

This was bad. Kent State went 1-11 on the season, their most losses since going 0-11 in 1998. The Golden Flashes’ lone win on the season came against FCS’s Central Connecticut way back on September 16th. Then followed nine straight losses to end the season, none of them really close. They lost 56-6 to UCF, 53-10 to Fresno State, 42-17 to Ohio, 49-19 to Bowling Green and 34-3 to Ball State. Kent State lost eight games by 20 or more points this season. This was a program that was in the MAC Championship game just two years ago, so a 1-11 season while getting pummeled weekly isn’t a good first impression for Burns.

You have to finish in this spot if you are fired before making it through your first season. Mississippi State fired Arnett after the Bulldogs began the season 4-6. Truth be told, Arnett was an emotional hire — he took over the program after the sudden passing of Mike Leach last December and led the Bulldogs to a bowl win. He got the full-time gig but had a difficult road this season. Losing quarterback Will Rogers hurt momentum for the season and the results just weren’t there.