Grading college football coaching hires 2024-’25, including Bill Belichick

Rich Rodriguez left the West Virginia Mountaineers with the highest winning percentage (.698) and the second-most wins (60) in program history. During his tenure, West Virginia turned from a three-win program in 2001 to a team delivering three consecutive seasons with double-digit wins from 2005-’07. While college football has changed plenty in the two-plus decades since, Rodriguez has proven he can win at smaller programs. Bringing Rodriguez home also generates a lot more excitement from boosters, which should result in an influx of NIL spending. While the Mountaineers might not turn into a College Football Playoff contender with Rodriguez, they could consistently become an 8-9 win team.

• Grade: A-

Related: Heisman Trophy winners history

Not only did the Purdue Boilermakers land a quality football coach with strong ties to the Midwest, but they also landed someone who can turn a program around pretty quickly. Before he arrived at UNLV, the Rebels went 7-23 in three seasons under Marcus Arroyo. Odom won nine games in his first season and just delivered UNLV its second 10-win season in program history along with consecutive Mountain West Championship Game appearances. Odom is absolutely the caliber of a football coach and program builder who can get the Boilermakers close to the level they reached with Jeff Brohm.

• Grade: A-

Related: College Football Games Today, College Football Playoff schedule

The theme of the college football coaching carousel this year seemed to be reunions. Scott Frost’s Nebraska tenure was a complete disaster (16-31) and he is entirely responsible for his own undoing. The hope is that a year away from football followed by a season spent as a senior analyst for Sean McVay leads to a turnaround. Frost to any other team would’ve received a ‘C-‘ from us, but he is exactly the guy who can get support from boosters and NIL money in the state of Florida can go a long way with the talent pool in the state. Frost certainly won’t take the Knights back to that 13-0 mountaintop with a Peach Bowl victory, but it’s not unreasonable to think 8-win seasons can be pretty standard within a few years.

• Grade: B-

Related: Heisman Watch 2024, final Heisman Trophy ballot

The UNLV Rebels suffered a big blow early in the college football coaching carousel when Barry Odom left for Purdue. Fortunately, school officials and boosters decided to keep investing in the football program by luring Dan Mullen out of sports media. Mullen finished his Mississippi State tenure with a .600 winning percentage, winning 8 or more games five times. In the Mountain West Conference, Mullen’s coaching acumen at a power program in a winnable conference with the investments made in the Rebels’ NIL funds can allow UNLV to consistently remain a contender.

• Grade: A-

Related: College Football Playoff Predictions

While he served as the USC Trojans assistant head coach and worked with linebackers in 2024, Matt Entz’s track record as a head coach speaks for itself. With North Dakota State from 2019-’23, Entz won two NCAA Division I championships and he won FCS Coach of the Year twice during that span with a 15-3 record in the D-1 playoffs and a 60-11 overall record. Fresno State is the perfect-sized program for Entz to build up in the coming years, potentially following a similar path down the line to a Power 4 job as Curt Cignetti did.

• Grade: A-

Related: Longest field goals in college football history

Formerly the running backs coach at Penn State (2014-’17), Mississippi State (2018) and Alabama (2019-’20), Charles Huff took what he learned from Nick Saban and James Franklin to Marshall. He picked up where Doc Holliday left off, winning seven-plus games in three of four seasons, including a 10-3 mark in 2024. Huff faces an uphill climb in turning Southern Miss around – 4 wins in the last two years – but his coaching prowess and experience can eventually result in the Golden Eagles’ first eight-win season since 2017.

• Grade: A-

Also Read: NFL coaching candidates

The Charlotte 49ers might’ve struck gold with Tim Albin. In four seasons with the Ohio Bobcats, Albin recorded three consecutive 10-win seasons following a 3-9 record in his first year at the helm. For context, the Bobcats had just one season with double-digit wins from 1969 to 2021. Albin takes over a program that hasn’t posted a winning record since 2019. It will probably take at least two years before we see strong results, but the track record at Ohio gives us a lot of hope that Albin can lead the 49ers to multiple eight-win seasons.

• Grade: A

Related: Highest paid college football coaches

After spending the majority of his coaching career as an assistant and coordinator in the NFL, Dowell Loggains made his way to college football in 2021. After two seasons with his alma mater as tight ends coach, Loggains took over as the South Carolina Gamecocks offensive coordinator and quarterback coach in 2023. The success of freshman quarterback LaNorris Sellers this season provides optimism for App State in the Seun Belt Conference, but we’re always a bit hesitant with inexperienced head coaches. The importance of managing recruiting and the transfer portal along with Loggains’s more limited college football ties to build a quality coaching staff are what dropped this grade.

• Grade: C+

Related: College Football Coaching Candidates

Bill Belichick will get North Carolina Tar Heels players ready for the NFL and it might not be long before he is overseeing one of the best defenses in the Power 4. However, we have significant concerns regarding Belichick’s patience to deal with players’ frequently changing NIL demands and we’re equally skeptical that a majority of student-athletes will want to stick around for a version of the ‘Patriot Way’ for more than two years. Coaching in college football is far more of a grind than the NFL and even with the massive influx of funding being injected into the Tar Heels’ NIL bank, it’s just hard to see how this meshes well for everyone long term. We think the results in 2025 will be very strong, but the drop-off will come and Belichick probably won’t stick around past 2027.

• Grade: B-