List of Coaches Who Jumped From one Top Tier Big 5 Team to Another

Submitted by alum96 on

I am working on some diary entries breaking down potential HC candidates outside of the same tired group; mostly to keep my sanity and to feel proud that I can do more homework on hiring our HC than our AD.

In the spirit of that I need your help.  As I listen to the yells for the Shaw, Gundy, Sumlin types can you please list for me which head coaches in the past 15+ years have jumped from 1 TOP TIER Big 5 conference team to another.  

Two coaches who have jumped sideways or slightly upward from ONE very successful "top 4 in the conference" team to a similar program are Saban and Urban but both had layovers in between their switches so was not a "direct steal" as people are proposing UM should do.

  1. Saban jumped from LSU to Bama ** (Miami in the NFL in the middle)
  2. Urban jumped from Florida to OSU** but it required a 1 year stay in the media so it was not like OSU  "hired him away" from Florida  as we are opining we can so easily do from A&M, Stanford, OK State.

EDIT2 - commentator mentioned Bert Bielema which would be a good example of a direct hire from Wiscy to Arkansas.  Actually it is a kind of bad statement for the Big 10 since he went from a top 4 team in the Big 10 to a non top 4 team in the SEC.  But it's as close of a "switch" as I can find.

Are there any transitions like that we can think of?  And I dont consider Sark from Washington to USC to be in that league.  UW is not currently similar to A&M or Stanford or OK State.  All 3 of these teams have been top 10ish the past 3-4 years on and off.  Washington is more akin to Iowa/Illinois of the Pac 12 in its current state - the 5th to 8th best team in its conference in any 1 year.  Same for Mack Brown from NC (ho hum ACC team) to Texas.  Not good comparables.

Very good programs like PSU, Texas, USC have taken coaches from Vandy, Louisville, Washington in the past year.  Those are the type of schools where top tier programs do pull coaches from 97% of the time.  That is very different than taking guys away from A&M, OK State, and Stanford  - all 3 of which have fielded multiple top 10ish teams the past 4 years.  Their coaches are in sweet spots and in rinse and reload situations annually now without the headache that comes from rebuilding in a crap conference.  We might as well go after Bob Stoops if people think pulling Gundy, Shaw, Sumlin is a high probability - all have a litany of reasons to stay which I won't extend this post by explaining.

Summary -  I cannot think of any major program (i.e. Texas, USC, Georgia, OSU, Michigan, Alabama, Notre Dame, FSU, Oklahoma, etc) who has pulled a very successful top 10-12ish team's coach out of their program and into theirs.  Which is what many here are proposing we can do. Were there a bunch from 7-10-15 years ago that I have missed? 

 

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roosterbaan

September 28th, 2014 at 3:06 PM ^

saban also has an asterisk. he had a brief cameo as the miami dolphins headcoach, but left mid-season to take the reigns of alabama.

that was before stephen ross bought miami

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karpodiem

September 28th, 2014 at 3:06 PM ^

You will probably get snarky responses, but I really do appreciate the work that goes into this research. Probably the only thing I enjoy reading on this site as of late

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 3:44 PM ^

Cumong man.  The argument you are making is if someone hired Rutgers's coach this February, off of a 11-2 season in the AAC, that 11-2 season happened in the Big 10 because technically at the time of the hire of said Rutgers coach, Rutgers was a Big 10 member.

Charlie Strong was not an ACC coach, just like Rutgers and Maryland's coaches were not Big 10 coaches the last 2 years.  In fact Rutgers and Louisville shared the same conference last year.

 

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ghost

September 28th, 2014 at 4:08 PM ^

No the argument I am making is that Louisville is quite possibly a top 4 team in the ACC this year.  Rutgers and Maryland aren't.  Charlie Strong was not under any circumstances going to be coaching in the American.  He was either going to the ACC or the Big12.  So he left an opportunity to be a potential top 4 team in the ACC to go to Texas.

 

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 3:49 PM ^

I would agree with Kiffin if it was Fulmer's Tennessee.  We are talking about "stealing" Gundy, Sumlin, Shaw as their programs are top 10-12 in the nation.  Kiffin had 1 year at Tennessee at 7-6 so not a parallel to the type of guys people are proposing we swipe.

Neuheisal's last 2 seasons at Colorado were 5-6, 8-4 before he went to Washington.  Sumlin, Shaw, Gundy are coming off multiple 10+ wins seasons stacked together.

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Mr Miggle

September 28th, 2014 at 4:37 PM ^

and it was certainly a high profile job.

Ty Willingham went from a ranked Stanford to ND.

Saban left MSU for LSU. He had built up a pretty good team first.

RR coming here should qualify. We didn't talk about 5 power conferences then because the best Big East programs were still all there.

You're using a very subjective standard. I think all of these could easily qualify. Tennessee was a high level job. MSU and WVU were coming off top ten rankings. If you're looking only for coaches moving directly from a top tier job with a powerhouse team at the moment, you may not find any.

  

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Tater

September 28th, 2014 at 3:21 PM ^

Les Miles "jumped" from OK State to LSU.  However, OK State wasn't on their current level.  Miles took OK State to the Houston, Cotton and Alamo bowls his last three years.  It was definitely considered a huge upward move at the time.

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 3:54 PM ^

Right but MSU was 6-6, 7-5, 6-6, and 9-2 in years leading into Saban's departure to LSU.  So 3 of those teams were mid tier Big 10, like 6th to 8th place teams. 

That is very different than stealing the type of guys we are proposing who are top 2-3 in their conference over 3*-4 years.

My larger point with this piece is what we are proposing is virtually unheard of.  One program going into another program and stealing a coach who has led that team to the top tier of its Big 5 conference and perennial 10+ win status.   But people throw it around like "all Michigan needs to do is show up and shove money down very successful coach's throat and we good.  It happens all the time"  This was a program Greg Schiano turned down.

 

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titanfan11

September 28th, 2014 at 3:33 PM ^

and I will follow along with the work you do. But I am not sure any of it will apply here.  Michigan is not a top 4 in the conference type of team right now, and  other coaches who are leading top teams would need some reason to come here.

Money might be a reason, but the other schools would most likely match it an offer an extension to keep their guys around.  A guy would need some Michigan connection to want to come here as well.  Now, perhaps they can find an ego guy, someone who wants the challenge of turning around a program and perhaps rising back to prominence.  

I think it will actually come down to guys in the big conferences who have taken their talent and got the most out of it to get to bowl games.  Not that he is a candidate or that I am endorsing him, but Gary Pinkel at Mizzou for instance.  He has moved into the SEC and won while acclimating to a new league and competing for talent with the likes of Bama, Auburn, A&M, South Carolina...and on and on.  

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 4:04 PM ^

Well the equation for this has FROM and TO

The FROM team would need to be the "top 3-4" team in a BCS conference who has been ranked top 10-15 annually for a few years with a successful coach people want to steal.

The TO team need not be "top 4" - the whole idea why they have a coaching vacancy is they currently suck.  So TO would be a blue blood program with deep pockets i.e. Michigan, Tennessee, Notre Dame (prior to Kelly), Alabama 7 years ago, etc

So the full equation is:

FROM (top 3ish in conference type, annual top 10-12ish overall in Big 5 conference team) TO (a top tier blue blood PROGRAM who is currently down...)

And I can't really find too many examples.  Meanwhile the working thesis by quite a few is to throw out a lot of "FROM" candidates (Sumlin, Gundy, Shaw etc) and expect them to walk on glass to Michigan as long as you throw them $6M.  As best as I can tell no one has pulled this off in the past 15 years. 

Almost universally the hire into a blue blood program comes from

  • (a) top team in non Big 5 conference
  • (b) coordinator from top team in Big conference or
  • (c) up and coming head coach from Big 5 conference in tier 2 (i.e middle of the pack but overachieving type team)

Less common is pull a guy from the NFL.

Almost never has the equation been

  • (d) take away coach from other top tier Big 5 conference team on a parallel move

 

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turd ferguson

September 28th, 2014 at 4:06 PM ^

Your criteria seem pretty restrictive, which could by where there are so few examples.  Another way of approaching this is to look at all of the times that a then-struggling, historic powerhouse replaced its coach over the last 10-20 years and classify where those coaches came from.  I'd imagine the categories would look something like:

  • assistant from own program
  • head coach from major conference (maybe highlighting the "top programs" as you define it)
  • assistant coach from major conference
  • head coach from smaller conference
  • NFL head coach
  • NFL assistant coach
  • Derek Dooley

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 4:32 PM ^

Right.  It is purposefully restrictive because these 3 coaches have unique characteristics.  They are coaches either at or top of their conferences, in a Big 5 conference, who are routinely pulling off 10+ wins and have their programs at a very high gear. 

These are also 3 candidates you routinely see from the fanbase in "who we should go hire". 

Generally you don't go and take those coaches away from said programs. 

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EGD

September 28th, 2014 at 3:48 PM ^

Some similar moves: --John Cooper going from a good Arizona State program to OSU -- Mike Price leaving Washington State for Alabama (sort of) -- Mack Brown leaving UNC for Texas -- Gary Barnett leaving Northwestern for Colorado These are all situations in which a coach left a mid-level program that he had built into a power for a traditionally superior program that was down at the time.

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 4:21 PM ^

Right but we are not talking about pulling out a mid tier coach - we are talkihg about taking either the 1st, 2nd, 3rd most sought after coach out of another conference who has that program surging

OK State has been #2 in Big 12 behind Oklahoma for the  past half decade as Texas fell off, Stanford has been #1 and #2 with Oregon, and Texas A&M is in a much deeper conference and has not been #1 and #2 in conference but a top 10-13 type of team overall with Sumlin; and currently #6 in the nation.

I ilke your examples so I am not shooting holes at you - just reviewing the data:

  • ASU was really good 2 years before OSU came calling for Cooper but the year they actually took him he was coming off a 7-4-1 season.  
  • Barnett was 5-7 and 3-9 in the 2 years before he left for Colorado.
  • Mike Price - hmm looking over his record he had about 15 years at Washington State which again is more like an Iowa with ups and downs.  He had a long mediocre record until spiking  his last 2 years at WSU before Bama came calling.  He was 3-8, 3-9, 4-7, 10-2, and 10-3 at WSU in his last 5 years.  Before that he had 9 years at WSU, with only 3 years over 7 wins.   Reminds me more of Brady Hoke than anything, a guy who parlayed a lot of mediocre seasons and a big run towards the end of his reign into a new job.

Mack Brown would probably be the closest parallel outside of Rich Rod and Beilema.

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alum96

September 28th, 2014 at 4:26 PM ^

Auburn is a fine example of a blue blood that was down on its luck at the time so a good example on that end.  Problem was Tuberville was 6-5, 5-6, 8-4 and 6-5 at Ole Miss.  3 of the 4 years he had a losing record in the SEC; the 4th year he was 4-4.

So basically he was Dan Mullen of his era I guess. 

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mgoblue78

September 28th, 2014 at 3:39 PM ^

Nebraska to Kansas to Stanford to Michigan.

 

Kipke

Michigan State to Michigan

Mackovic

Illinois to Texas

Agase

Northwestern to Purdue

Young

Arizona to Purdue

Parsegian

Northwestern to Notre Dame

 

 

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Mr. Yost

September 28th, 2014 at 4:56 PM ^

Michigan isn't a top program...so the list should be bigger. 

Miami is no different, then say Miami (FL) right now. If we got Golden, some would consider that a lateral move...in this exercise it seems like it wouldn't qualify because it would be an obvious step up.

Same with Butch Jones at Tennessee. What's the difference between us and them? Louisville, NC State, Georgia Tech, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma St., West Virginia, TCU, Washington, Oregon St., Arizona St., UCLA, South Carolina, Mississippi St., etc.

Sure in the 90s and when it comes to resources these teams weren't/aren't in our league...But over the last 5-10 years, Michigan would be lucky to be in a class with these teams. On paper, going to Michigan is a big jump in name...but that's it.

Michigan, Texas, Florida...all they've been as of late is just a name. Going from one of those schools to one of these isn't as big of a jump as it sounds, hell, it may not be a jump at all in some cases.

So I understand the point of this is to prove that people need to shut up about Saban, Sumlin, etc. - they do. But my problem is, Michigan isn't anywhere NEAR the Saban, Sumlin, etc. level

Neither was Texas. That's why they struck out on their first 9 candidates, because they thought they were at that level. They ended up with Strong, coming from a school that was on their plateau...Louisville. That's a tough pill to swallow for Texas fans, but it's the truth. Texas isn't Alabama right now and hasn't been for quite some time. Same goes for Michigan.

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Sambojangles

September 28th, 2014 at 5:08 PM ^

Brian Kelly--Cincy was becoming a dominant program in a weakening Big East. At the time, however, they still had WVU,Syracuse, Pitt, etc. It wasn't the mess it has been, as a conference, in the 5 years since.

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