Back
The college football coaching carousel opened early with three Power Four firings before November, and with more jobs likely to follow, the best candidates are coaches whose success at smaller programs or on title-contending staffs could translate quickly.
Maryland fired head coach Mike Locksley on Oct. 21, NC State and Baylor followed by firing Dave Doeren and Dave Aranda, and USC’s Lincoln Riley and Colorado’s Deion Sanders sit on the hot seat. These six candidates belong at the top of any search list.
Wake Forest head coach Jake Dickert is the top name in this cycle after turning a program coming off back-to-back 4-8 seasons into a ranked team in less than two years. He won nine games in his debut season, a school record for a first-year coach, and closed it with a Duke’s Mayo Bowl win over Mississippi State.
This fall has gone even better. Wake is 6-1, ranked No. 14 in the AP poll and became the first school with four Power Four road wins through seven weeks. The lone loss came against Miami, and the Demon Deacons outscored their last three ACC opponents 136-24, a stretch that included a 57-3 win over Stanford, the largest ACC victory in school history.
The Wisconsin native has won through unusual circumstances before. He took over Washington State midseason in 2021 after head coach Nick Rolovich was fired, earned the full-time job and went 23-20 in Pullman.
Prying him away is the hurdle for any school. Asked about the openings on Monday, Dickert said, “They know exactly where I sit on that.” ESPN college football reporter Pete Thamel raised the question every lower-tier Power Four job will face: “Do you leave Wake Forest for the Wake Forest job of the Big Ten?”
With his name surfacing even for jobs that aren’t open yet, Dickert can afford to wait for the right fit.
Jason Eck has built the Lobos into a College Football Playoff contender in less than two seasons, and his track record shows the turnaround isn’t a one-time result.
He went 9-4 in his debut year, tied for the Mountain West title and was named the league’s Coach of the Year. This season, New Mexico is 6-1 and 3-0 in conference play after a 21-16 win over North Dakota State, and its only loss came 14-6 at Oklahoma. No opponent has scored more than 18 points against a defense that leads the country in scoring defense and forced turnovers.
The former Wisconsin offensive lineman did the same kind of work at Idaho, going 26-13 with three FCS playoff appearances.
Colorado could become the most interesting opening for Eck if the Buffaloes make a change. Colorado athletic director Fernando Lovo hired Eck at New Mexico before leaving for Boulder, and Eck spent 2002 and 2003 as a graduate assistant there. Sanders’ buyout exceeds $25 million, though, so a change there is far from certain.
Eck stayed in Albuquerque last winter after other programs called his representatives. “We’re making this an incredible job, which people haven’t said in a while,” he said.
Any Power Four program that needs a full rebuild would be hiring a coach who has already turned around two programs.
Bryant Haines is the assistant most likely to land a Power Four head coaching job this winter because his defenses have already carried a national champion. The Hoosiers went 16-0 last season, beat Miami 27-21 in the national title game and ranked second nationally in scoring defense, and Haines won the Broyles Award as the nation’s top assistant.
The 41-year-old Piqua, Ohio, native has worked under Indiana head coach Curt Cignetti every season since 2014 except one, following him from IUP to Elon, James Madison and Bloomington. Cignetti hands him full control of the defense. “He’s the head coach of the defense,” Cignetti said.
This year’s unit has kept Indiana in the Playoff race while the offense has sputtered. It held Ohio State to 19 points in the Hoosiers’ only loss, then kept Michigan out of the end zone in a 13-6 overtime win, Indiana’s first victory in Ann Arbor since 1967. Defensive end Tobi Osunsanmi had 8.5 sacks in four seasons at Kansas State and has nine through eight games in Bloomington.
Schools have tried to pry him loose before. “Bryant had some calls, had some people very seriously interested in him,” Cignetti said in December, and Indiana’s new deal pays Haines $3 million in 2026.
Haines has never been a head coach, so a school hiring him would be betting on his preparation more than his resume. Broyles winners have handled that jump well: 19 of the award’s 30 winners later became head coaches.
The Hurricanes’ offense is among the nation’s most productive through three starting quarterbacks in three seasons, thanks in no small part to Shannon Dawson. Cam Ward led the country in scoring under Dawson before becoming the No. 1 pick in the 2025 NFL Draft, Carson Beck guided Miami to last season’s national title game and Darian Mensah has the top-ranked Hurricanes at 7-0.
Miami leads the nation at 49 points per game. Mensah has 22 touchdown passes against one interception, and he completed 31 of 37 passes for 387 yards and four scores in a 52-23 win over Pitt last Saturday.
Dawson’s path strengthens his case. He started under Hal Mumme with no pay for six months, driving the team van and doing laundry, before running offenses at West Virginia, Kentucky, Southern Miss, Houston and Miami. His stops at Stephen F. Austin and Houston also give him Texas recruiting ties that would help at Baylor or any program leaning on the state.
He also sounds like a coach ready to lead a staff. “The one thing that I’ve learned is to swallow my ego,” Dawson said.
Dawson has no head coaching experience, and he spoke with Coastal Carolina about its opening last cycle before staying in Coral Gables. A Power Four head coaching job is the kind of offer that could pull him away from the nation’s No. 1 team.
Charles Huff has won at every stop, and his roots make him the most logical fit for Maryland. The Denton, Maryland, native played center at Hampton, coached as an assistant in College Park in 2009 and later recruited Saquon Barkley to Penn State before coaching Najee Harris at Alabama.
His head coaching resume covers three programs in six seasons, and he’s reached bowl eligibility every year. He went 32-20 at Marshall, including a 2024 conference title, turned a 1-11 Southern Miss team into a 7-5 bowl team in one season and has Memphis at 6-2 in his first year. The Tigers clinched a 13th straight bowl trip with a 41-34 overtime comeback against East Carolina, and transfer quarterback Marcus Stokes has thrown for 300 yards four times.
That combination fits a Maryland program still chasing its first Power Four win this season, but his recruiting background would play at any program in the East. The Athletic’s Ralph Russo sees the Maryland interest running both ways, saying “if Charles Huff can get the Maryland job, I think he’s taking it.”
Huff told his team weeks ago that “every job that’s getting ready to come open, my name’s going to be up for,” and he’s kept the focus on Memphis. “You don’t get a job in the middle of the season,” Huff said.
Another move would give Huff four jobs in four seasons, and Memphis was already winning before he arrived. Few candidates match his head coaching record and his ties to the DMV recruiting area.
Boise State head coach Spencer Danielson has the strongest resume of any Group of Six coach and has shown the least interest in leaving. The former Azusa Pacific linebacker won three straight conference titles from 2023 to 2025, took the Broncos to the College Football Playoff as the No. 3 seed in 2024 and has them at 6-1 in their first Pac-12 season.
Boise State has won six straight since a 34-27 loss at Oregon, including a 38-20 win over Huff’s Memphis team in which the Broncos scored the final 21 points. Danielson earned his 30th career win with a 31-10 victory at Washington State last Saturday.
His name keeps landing on Baylor lists, and his outspoken Christian faith lines up with the Baptist school’s identity. Former Baylor quarterback Robert Griffin III even publicly backed Danielson for the job.
Danielson shut down the speculation on Monday. “I absolutely feel like God has called me here,” he said, adding that he has “zero interest” in other openings.
Any school that calls would also face a contract running through 2030 and a buyout starting at $3.5 million.
Back
Top
| Privacy Statement Terms of Service Contact |
Refresh
|
All the best breaking news stories from Apex Scores Lite. Optimised for feature phones and low end Android devices, Apex Scores Lite helps users with legacy devices and poor network connectivity access the latest football news and live scores. Particularly relevant for breaking football news in Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa.