Ranking the 10 college football head coaching vacancies
Oct 24, 2015; Miami Gardens, FL, USA; Miami Hurricanes quarterback Brad Kaaya (15) throws a pass against the Clemson Tigers during the first half at Sun Life Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Steve Mitchell-USA TODAY Sports
You might expect the Miami Hurricanes to rank higher on this list, but the fact of the matter is that whoever replaces Al Golden will be stepping into a job that isn’t nearly as good today as it was a decade ago.
One of the proudest college football programs in the country, Miami won four national championships from 1983 to 1991, and added another in 2001. However, the Miami dynasty of the 1980’s occurred when it was far less common for schools all across the country to recruit South Florida.
Plus, with Florida State competing for national titles and Florida on the rise, in addition to USF and UCF, who didn’t even play football at the FBS level (or at all, in USF’s case), when Miami was an elite program, competition for the area’s top talent is stiffer than ever.
Furthermore, the prestige the program gained during the ’80s and ’90s is no longer a recruiting tool. Local kids growing up in the 1980s may have felt a desire to stay close to home and play for “The U” when the program was at its height in popularity, but today’s high school seniors were born in the late 1990s.
When Miami won the BCS National Championship in 2001, today’s recruits were three, four or five years old. The U those recruits grew up watching hasn’t won ten games in a season in more than a decade and recorded more than seven victories in a season only twice since 2005.
Despite disappointing won-loss records, the Miami football program has produced a lot of NFL talent in recent years, but only three of the 50 highest rated Florida high school players in the 2015 recruiting class (according to 247Sports) signed with the Canes – and none of the top 13!
Plus, the Hurricanes play their home games in a half empty Sun Life Stadium, which is hardly enticing to recruits. As a small private school, Miami doesn’t have a large alumni base (or fan base for that matter since many fair-weather fans left when the dynasty ended), and the lack of funding for facilities and a high coaching salary (Golden’s $2.5 million salary ranked No. 42 in the country last year) hurts.
That said, the Hurricanes can win again. The right coach can turn the program around and perhaps even bring back the glory days. But right now, Miami has only the fourth best available head coaching job.
Next: Virginia Tech