Jim Harbaugh Now Tied with Lloyd Carr in Overall Win Percentage

Submitted by Maizinator on November 27th, 2022 at 1:25 PM

With the victory yesterday, Jim Harbaugh is now 73 and 24 and moves up to a .753 overall win percentage to tie Lloyd Carr.   Next stop Gary Moeller at .758.

The only Michigan coaches with more overall wins:

Bo Schembechler (194)
Fielding Yost (165)
Lloyd Carr (122)

https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/schools/michigan/coaches.html

Looking forward to adding some more championships to that resume as well.  Go Blue!

Indy Pete - Go Blue

November 27th, 2022 at 1:27 PM ^

The vast majority around here clamored for his firing.  I am proud to say I stuck by and believed in his ability to take us to the promised land. Dude has had incredible success at every coaching stop!  And - he is ours!

UMxWolverines

November 27th, 2022 at 2:09 PM ^

Looking back we were unfair and wrong for wanting him fired, HOWEVER the other side was just as bad, refusing to believe there were issues in the program with all the transfers and leaving early and coming out flat for rivalry games. Not to mention so much of the "we can't compete with OSU in today's college football" and "we have too many academic hurdles". 

Michigan and Harbaugh have proved we can be the best of the best in the country. 

UMinSF

November 27th, 2022 at 3:02 PM ^

Not to pick a fight, but I for one was acutely aware of the issues - but also aware that:

- Harbaugh had a lengthy, stellar track record of success, worthy of earning patience

- Despite the issues, Michigan was in a FAR better place than it had been in years

- RR and Hoke years had severely damaged the program

- Coaching turnover and rapid churn is a recipe for disaster. Just ask Nebraska

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I felt pretty strongly that calls for firing were, frankly, kind of absurd. Living in SF gave me a close-up view of just how great a job he did at 3 west coast stops.

The idea that Matt Campbell or Luke Fickell (or whatever other names came up) is a better football coach than Jim Harbaugh? Ridiculous.

Bo Harbaugh

November 27th, 2022 at 6:07 PM ^

The idiots that wanted JH fired were the "all that matters is wins and losses" crowd. They didn't care to dig into analytics or use history as a guide.  Dude won everywhere he has been, including the NFL where Saint Nick and Sleeze Meyer couldn't cut it.

Not looking at what he inherited, the overall direction he was taking the program, and most importantly - that there was a death star already built in Cbus that he needed to catch up with was unrealistic.

Add in some absurdly bad luck and flukish losses (MSU - Punt 6, MSU - Tuck luck ^2, OSU 2016 robbery in the shoe) and you had a coach whose record (particularly against rivals was less stellar than it probably should have been. But, that is and was scar tissue he and the program had to own.

There are steps to this and we had to go from meh, to good, to great.  Last step is elite and we are knocking on that door. Jim got us from meh to good very quickly - but we were on par with the PSU's and Wisconsins of the world.  The pitchfork crowd didn't have the patience for great and were also unwilling to give Jim the benefit of the doubt on the absurd bad luck he had in some early games of his tenure.

Once you build the foundation and become a great program with depth, the margin of error increases greatly, as we are seeing the past couple years.  Will we ever be Bama or UGA - I doubt it.  But Jim can definitely replicate what Dabo pulled off at Clemson, except that they play in a shittier conference of course.

Kevin13

November 27th, 2022 at 6:25 PM ^

I remember people saying we should fire Harbaugh and hire Matt Campbell and pay him as much money as it takes to bring him here. Here we now sit at 12-0 and Iowa State is 4-8 and I never hear his named mentioned in coaching searches anymore. Glad some people aren’t making decisions in our athletic department 

WichitanWolverine

November 27th, 2022 at 1:28 PM ^

Minor threadjack since it’s not worth it’s own post but someone will know the answer: when did Michigan last beat an undefeated OSU in Columbus? Has it ever happened?

Also how many times have we beaten an undefeated OSU period?

FrankMurphy

November 27th, 2022 at 1:49 PM ^

1996 is the answer to your first question.

I don't know the exact answer to your second question, but there was a stretch in the 90's when we played undefeated, top 5, heavily favored OSU teams only to defeat them soundly. It happened in 1993, 1995, and 1996. The 1993 win was a 28-0 shutout. The 1995 win kept them from winning the Big Ten Championship. The 1996 win kept them from winning the national championship, as they had already clinched the Big Ten Championship and would go on to win the Rose Bowl, leaving The Game as the only blemish on their record that year.

sdogg1m

November 27th, 2022 at 3:10 PM ^

While my sentiment isnt as strong as the original poster as I was grateful for Lloyd's first part of his tenure, the last half stunk.

He started the losing to Ohio State; was guaranteed to lose the first away game of the season; and gave us the App State debacle. Plus he screwed us after he retired.

RedRum

November 27th, 2022 at 7:17 PM ^

You fuck off Don, Lloyd was a great guy, a players coach, clean etc. he also absolutely killed UM for 3-4 years by draining the talent. He then stuck around and under minded his successor. These are facts. Doesn’t make Lloyd a bad person, but it does taint his legacy. And again Don, Fuck off!!

UMinSF

November 27th, 2022 at 3:14 PM ^

Your username indicates you've been around awhile despite the low point total.

Did you not watch Hoke's last season, or for that matter the entirety of the RR/Hoke eras? C'mon man, the program was a mess. 

Hoke bequeathed some raw material, that's it. Michigan football hadn't been in such a low state since the 60's.

 

Don

November 27th, 2022 at 2:16 PM ^

If we beat Purdue, Harbaugh will have 2 undisputed conference titles, which is one more than legend Fritz Crisler, whose only outright conference title was in his last season in 1947. Michigan shared the title in '43.

AlbanyBlue

November 27th, 2022 at 2:44 PM ^

The main reason I am on-board with Jim Harbaugh is that he has evolved his own thinking and perception about his coaching and that of his staff over his tenure.

  • He has improved his coaching staff by making some serious home run hires. I'd put our staff and its player development up against anyone at this moment.
  • He has become more focused on fostering a more diverse offense -- while still being run-heavy of course -- to make it able to function against basically any team in the country. Case in point: OSU had to sell out against the run, leading to chunk plays and long TDs in both the run and pass games. If they'd have played it straight, we'd have suffocated them, drowned ferret style.
  • He has seen the importance of becoming more innovative, focusing on dual-threat QBs on offense and a younger, more creative defensive staff.
  • In the last two seasons, he has become laser-focused on continual planning for he OSU game, including overall scheme, practice time, and even game planning throughout the season, practicing concepts to be used against OSU whenever possible. (Sorry, Illinois)

TL;DR -- Jim has improved his coaching ability, raising his own level to that of top-5 head coach in the nation. Everyone should be on board.

ironman4579

November 27th, 2022 at 3:00 PM ^

I still say the .758 for Moeller is bull crap.  He didn't win 75.8% of his games.  Love Gary but that's always bothered me about the way winning percentage is calculated, and I'll die on this hill.

jmblue

November 27th, 2022 at 4:24 PM ^

In football, ties are calculated as half a win and half a loss.  Moeller's record is 44-13-3, so his win percentage is calculated as 45.5/60 = .758

If you do it the soccer way (only wins are calculated), his win percentage is .733 (and tie percentage is .050).

kalamazoo

November 27th, 2022 at 4:22 PM ^

Moeller Regular Season:

60 games, 44 wins, 13 losses, 3 ties. Ties count as 50% wins.

Calc: (44 wins + 1.5 "ties")/60 games = 75.8% (rounded) winning percentage

Moeller Bowl Games:

5 games, 4 wins, 1 loss.

Calc: 4 wins/5 games= 80% winning percentage

Moeller Regular Season + Bowl Games:

Calc: (44 reg wins + 1.5 ties + 4 bowl wins)/65 games = 76.2% (rounded) winning percentage

Summary

Moeller had 75.8% winning percentage for regular season games and 76.2% when including bowl games, according to data on the linked website.

It may be one of the bowl games was "filling in"...Bo had an issue at the Hall of Fame Bowl, but I'm not sure if Moeller was considered head coach that day.

If we removed ties but still counted the game (treating tie as a loss), then the winning percentage would go down to 44/60 = 73.3% (rounded) for regular season games. If we removed tied games completely (don't count them at all), then the winning percentage would go up to 44/57 = 77.3% for regular season games. Since sometimes teams would play for the tie as a method to avoid a loss and in some regard remain undefeated, then perhaps we need to keep using the original calculation for 0.5 wins for each tie. Moeller right up there in percentage. Just didn't have as many games as Carr.