Michigan football has had some legendary coaches over the course of its program’s history, but who stands out as the best?
The Michigan Wolverines reign among college football royalty as one of the most storied programs in all of America. The culture of the program, from The Big House to “Hail to the Victors”, to the famous winged helmets, shows the program’s instantly recognizable brand.
They have been playing football in Ann Arbor since 1879 and have compiled 943-339-36 overall record, and have the NCAA record for most wins as a program and the highest winning-percentage in all of Division I FBS (.730). The Wolverine program has claimed 11 national championships and 42 conference championships, the most of any Big Ten school.
Michigan’s program has seen many, many generations of talent come and gone. Throughout the program’s 139-year history, producing three Heisman Trophy winners in Tom Harmon, Desmond Howard and Charles Woodson. Other famous names include Tom Brady, Dan Dierdorf, Anthony Carter, Jim Mandich, Brandon Graham and the 38th President of the United States, Gerald Ford.
The great players were complimented by even better coaching. Out of the 20 head coaches that have served the Michigan program, half of them have been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame. This list will include the usual suspects such as Bo Schembechler, Fielding H. Yost and Fritz Crisler.
However, there will be names from Wolverine past that will surprise some, but where will these coaches be ranked?
10. Jim Harbaugh: 2015-present
- Career Record: 28-11
The current man in charge of the Michigan program starts off the list. Jim Harbaugh was a star quarterback for Bo Schembechler’s Wolverines in the mid-1980’s. Following a solid NFL career, he earned his first full-time coaching job as quarterbacks coach of the Oakland Raiders. Two years later, he became head coach of San Diego University and lead the Toreros to two conference titles in three years. In 2007 he was hired by Stanford and led a significant turnaround of the Cardinal program, the pinnacle being a 12-win season in 2010.
Following a successful turnaround of the Stanford program, Harbaugh became head coach of the San Francisco 49ers and led them to the Super Bowl in his second season. His 49ers career ended not long after due to a fallout with 49ers management, which allowed him to return to Ann Arbor in 2015. His first season was a successful one, leading Michigan to a 10-3 record and a bowl win. In 2016, the pressure was on for the Wolverines to contend for a national title. They did reach 9-0, but a stunning road loss to Iowa, followed by a loss to rival Ohio State, sent them spiraling out of playoff contention.
Michigan was expected to reload in 2017, but did not do so effectively, finishing the season with an 8-5 record and a bowl loss to South Carolina, leading to some questioning Harbaugh’s job security, absurdly enough. There’s no question Harbaugh knows how to win in Ann Arbor and many expect him to be higher up on this list once he is done coaching the maize and blue.
9. Gary Moeller: 1990-1994
- Career Record: 44-13-2
- Awards and Accolades: 1990-’92 Big Ten Champions, 1991 & ’92 Big Ten Coach of the Year
Coming in at number nine is the man who replaced the legendary Bo Schembechler following his retirement in 1989. Gary Moeller spent a majority of his career as a trusted assistant for Schembechler, getting his start in college coaching at Miami of Ohio in 1967. Moeller was brought to Michigan when Schembechler was hired in 1969 and served various roles until he was hired by Illinois in 1977. However, he would return to Michigan following three dismal seasons and again served multiple roles until Schembechler’s retirement in 1989.
Moeller’s first year as head coach was very successful, finishing at 9-3 and winning the conference championship, however they shared with three other teams, sending them to the Gator Bowl. Moeller’s teams would win two more Big Ten Championships, culminating in an undefeated season in 1992, where they finished 9-0-3 and scored a Rose Bowl win over Washington.
Following back-to-back 8-4 campaigns, Moeller was fired in the spring of 1995 due to a run-in with authorities. He would go on to serve as an assistant for the Cincinnati Bengals, Detroit Lions, Chicago Bears and Jacksonville Jaguars, while serving as interim head coach for the Lions in 2000.
8. Gustave Ferbert: 1897-1899
- Career Record: 24-3-1
- Awards and Accolades: 1898 Western Conference Champions
Gustave Ferbert is likely a name many Michigan fans haven’t heard of up until now, but he did play an important role in the building of the program. Ferbert was a star running back for the Wolverines from 1893-1896 and took the head coaching job soon following his graduation.
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In his first season in 1897, Ferbert’s Wolverines finished 6-1-1 and more notably, marked the first meeting between Ohio State and Michigan, which Michigan won 34-0.
Ferbert’s best year as head coach came in 1898, when the Wolverines ended the year with an undefeated record at 10-0. It was also the first conference championship in program history as they won the then Western Conference with a 3-0 record. It was during this season that Michigan was deemed “The Champions of the West”, a memorable line in “Hail to the Victors.”
Ferbert coached one more season in 1899, finishing 8-2 before leaving Michigan for the booming gold mining industry in Alaska.
7. Harry Kipke: 1929-1937
- Career Record: 46-26-4
- Awards and Accolades: 1930-’33 Big Ten Champions, 1932 & ’33 National Championship
The next coach is a man whose name is remembered by the street that passes by Michigan Stadium. Harry Kipke was a star halfback for Fielding H. Yost’s Wolverines from 1920 to 1923, leading Michigan to a national championship in 1923. Following graduation, he spent four years as an assistant for Mizzou before returning to Michigan to coach Michigan State. In his one season in East Lansing, he finished with a 3-4-1 record before his alma mater came calling in 1929.
His first season at Michigan was a bit rough, finishing 5-3-1, but only going 1-3-1 in the Big Ten. However, over the next four years, Michigan would have a record of 33-1-3, winning four consecutive Big Ten Championships and back-to-back national championships in 1932 and 1933. His final four years were not as impressive unfortunately, trading off between 4-4 and 1-7 before retiring following the 1937 season.
After his retirement, Kipke became a member of the Michigan Board of Regents for seven years, joined the U.S. Navy and became the president of the Coca-Cola Company of Chicago.
6. Bump Elliot: 1959-1968
- Career Record: 51-42-2
- Awards and Accolades: 1964 Big Ten Champions
The man who preceded Bo Schembechler comes in at number six on the list. Bump Elliot was a star halfback for Fritz Crisler’s final two teams at Michigan, leading the Wolverines to the 1947 national championship. Elliot got his start in coaching immediately after graduation as an assistant at Michigan. He would have stops as an assistant at Oregon State and Iowa before returning to Ann Arbor in 1957 and becoming head coach in 1959.
Elliot’s first five season’s were rough, never winning more than six games and never finishing higher the fifth in the conference standings. However, his team in 1964 finished 9-1 and won the Big Ten Championship and won the Rose Bowl as well. His final four seasons saw a return to mediocrity and following a 50-14 shellacking by Ohio State in 1968, Elliot stepped down as head coach.
He would transition to an administrative career, spending a year as associate athletic director before becoming the athletic director at Iowa, where he would spend 21 years leading the Hawkeyes athletic program.
5. Bennie Oosterbaan: 1948-1958
- Career Record: 63-33-4
- Awards and Accolades: 1948-’50 Big Ten Champions, 1948 National Championship
A Michigan man unlike many others, Bennie Oosterbaan lived his life for the maize and blue. He was a three-sport athlete at Michigan, including an All-American in football and basketball from 1925 to 1928. He remained at Michigan after graduation as an assistant for the football team for almost 20 years. During this time period, Oosterbaan also had an eight-year stint as head basketball coach for the Wolverines.
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Fritz Crisler named Oosterbaan his successor following the 1948 Rose Bowl. His first season with Michigan was a smashing success as he led the Wolverines to another perfect season and their second consecutive national championship. Michigan would win two more conference championships before the dark times that came soon after. Following 1950, Oosterbaan’s record was 42-28-2, mediocre by Michigan standards.
Oosterbaan retired from coaching following the 1958 season, but continued to serve as an administrator at the school until 1972.
4. Lloyd Carr: 1995-2007
- Career Record: 122-40
- Awards and Accolades: 1997, ’98, ’00, ’03-’04 Big Ten Champions, 1997 National Championship, 1997 AFCA Coach of the Year, 1997 George Munger Award, 1997 Paul “Bear” Bryant Award, 1997 Walter Camp Coach of the Year Award, 2007 Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Award
The second-winningest coach in Michigan history and number four on the list is Lloyd Carr. Carr played college football at Mizzou and Northern Michigan as a quarter back from 1964 through 1967. He spent the next seven years as a coach at various high schools before being hired as an assistant at Eastern Michigan in 1976. Two seasons later he joined Gary Moeller’s staff at Illinois. He then worked a season at West Virginia before coming to Michigan in 1980.
Carr would spend the next fourteen years as an assistant at Ann Arbor before becoming head coach in 1995 following the departure of Gary Moeller. Carr had mild success his first two seasons before Michigan rose back to prominence in 1997, finishing the year 12-0 and winning the Big Ten and national championship. Carr would win four more Big Ten Championships in 1998, 2000, 2003 and 2004.
He would retire from coaching following Michigan’s win in the Capital One Bowl over Florida in 2008. Carr still remains active with the university today in various fundraisers.
3. Fritz Crisler: 1938-1947
- Career Record: 71-16-3
- Awards and Accolades: 1943 & ’47 Big Ten Champions, 1947 National Championship, 1947 AFCA Coach of the Year
The man who helped create Michigan’s iconic winged helmet was coach Fritz Crisler. Crisler played college football for legendary coach Amos Alonzo Stagg at the University of Chicago from 1919 to 1921. He would join Stagg’s staff as an assistant following graduation and stayed for seven seasons. Crisler would become head coach at Minnesota in 1930, but following two dismal seasons, left to coach the Princeton Tigers. While at Princeton, his teams won two national championships before being lured away to Michigan in 1938.
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Crisler never won less than six games in a season throughout his entire Michigan career and only finished below second in the Big Ten twice. He finally brought his first Big Ten Championship to Ann Arbor in 1943 as Michigan finished the year 8-1 and 6-0 in conference. In 1948, Crisler and the “Mad Magicians” finished the season 10-0 and won the Big Ten Championship, and with a Rose Bowl win over USC, won its first national championship since 1933
Following Michigan’s Rose Bowl victory, Crisler stepped down and named former Michigan player and assistant coach Bennie Oosterbaan his replacement. Crisler remained at the university as the athletic director, which he started as in 1941 and would remain in the position until his retirement in 1968.
2. Bo Schembechler: 1969-1989
- Career Record: 194-48-5
- Awards and Accolades: 1969, ’71-’74, ’76-’78, ’80, ’82, ’86, ’88, ’89 Big Ten Champions, 1969 AFCA Coach of the Year, 1969 Walter Camp Coach of the Year, 1977 Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year, 1989 George Munger Award
This will come as a surprise to some, but Bo Schembechler comes in at number two on the list. However, there is no denying how instrumental he was in the program’s history. Schembechler played at Miami of Ohio under Sid Gillman and future rival Woody Hayes. After his graduation, he joined Hayes as an assistant at Ohio State in 1952, which was then followed by stops at Presbyterian, Bowling Green and Northwestern before returning to Ohio State in 1958. He was then hired as head coach of his alma mater Miami and remained there for six years until Michigan came calling.
When Schembechler arrived at Ann Arbor in 1969, Michigan’s program was in a prolonged slump, having only won one Big Ten title since 1950. That changed in his first season as the Wolverines won the Big Ten following their historic upset of then-number one Ohio State. Michigan would win 12 more Big Ten Championships in Schembechler’s tenure. During his stay, Schembechler changed the culture of the Michigan program, including hanging the legendary sign that states “Those who stay will be champions”.
Schembechler stepped down as head coach following the 1989 season to focus on his career as athletic director. He would go on to be President of the Detroit Tigers for three years before reconnecting with the university and remaining active in the football program. Schembechler died on Nov. 17, 2006, the day before the first ever No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup in Michigan-Ohio State history.
1. Fielding H. Yost: 1901-1923, 1925-1926
- Career Record: 165-29-10
- Awards and Accolades: 1901-’04, ’06, ’18, ’22-’23, ’25-’26 Big Ten Champions, 1901-’04, ’22-’23, 25′-’26 National Champions
The greatest coach in Michigan Football history is the man who made the Wolverines into a national power, Fielding H. Yost. Yost played his college football at West Virginia and Lafayette College. After his playing days, he made numerous head coaching stop at Ohio Wesleyan, Nebraska, Kansas, Stanford and San Jose State before becoming the head coach of the Michigan program in 1901.
Yost made an instant impact, winning four national championships in a row to start off his Michigan career with his fabled “Point-a-minute” teams. Yost also was the winning coach in the first ever Rose Bowl where Michigan defeated Stanford 49-0. He would win another Big Ten title in 1906 before Michigan would leave the conference for nearly 10 years. When the Wolverines rejoined in 1917, it wasn’t long before they were champions once more, winning another national title in 1918.
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As he headed towards the twilight of his career, Yost saved his best for last, the Wolverines won back-to-back national championships in 1922 and 1923 before Yost retired following the 1923 season. But after George Little left the program after one season, Yost returned and led the team to two more national championships in 1925 and 1926 before retiring for good. Yost remained athletic director until 1940 and passed away in 1946.