College Football: 25 greatest head coaches of the 21st century

Best college football coaches of 21st century: 15. Frank Beamer

• Murray State Racers (1981-86)
• Virginia Tech Hokies (1987-15)

Frank Beamer simply has to make this list. He is a true icon in college football. What he did at Virginia Tech was impressive. He inherited an awful program and built it into a contender in the conference. Because of him, people wanted to go to Virginia Tech.

Beamer turned VT around before the turn of the century, but he still did a lot in the latter part of his career. In 10 of his 16 seasons from 2000 to 2015, the Hokies won 10 or more games. This was also during the Hokies’ transition from the Big East to the ACC, and Beamer transitioned extremely well.

It’s always tough to go from a smaller conference to the Power 5. The competition gets tougher, and Virginia Tech now had to deal with teams like Clemson and Florida State.

However, they managed to win the ACC Championship in their first year in the conference, and Beamer won ACC Coach of the Year because of it. He also won the same award the next season, but the Hokies lost in the Conference Championship game.

Beamer also managed to take his team to a bowl game every year of this century. Whether they were the small school in the Big East or the new kids in the ACC, Beamer always got to at least six wins.

Winning a title never happened with Beamer, but that doesn’t make what he did a failure. Virginia Tech became relevant, and that is very hard to do. No matter what the Hokies do in the future, they have Beamer to thank for putting them on the map. Rings or not, he carried the program.