Adam RittenbergSep 30, 2025, 06:52 AM ETCloseCollege football reporter; joined ESPN in 2008. Graduate of Northwestern University.Follow on X
Kayden McDonald comes up with huge sack for OSU (0:35)Ohio State’s Kayden McDonald sacks Demond Williams Jr. on a fourth down stop. (0:35)
Texas Tech defensive coordinator Shiel Wood and offensive coordinator Mack Leftwich
When Miami fell short of the College Football Playoff despite having the nation’s top quarterback and offense in 2024, coach Mario Cristobal needed a new voice for the defense and found one in Corey Hetherman, a respected coordinator from Minnesota whose strong work had gone mostly under the radar.
When Florida State crashed out to a 2-10 finish in 2024, coach Mike Norvell’s full sweep of the program included two attention-grabbing coordinator hires in Gus Malzahn (offense) and Tony White (defense).
Hetherman, Malzahn and White aren’t the only reasons this week’s Miami-Florida State game has regained some juice, but their impact has been noticeable. Miami ranks ninth nationally in points allowed (11.5 PPG) and tied for eighth against the run (76.3 YPG). Florida State leads the nation in both scoring (53 PPG) and total offense (600 YPG), and its defense entered Friday’s game at Virginia ranked in the top 25 in several major categories.
Other teams also are witnessing the impact of first-year coordinators, from positive to concerning to somewhere in between. Oklahoma’s offseason makeover on offense included adding not only quarterback John Mateer from Washington State, but also his playcaller there in Ben Arbuckle. Joey McGuire brought in playcallers Shiel Wood (defense) and Mack Leftwich (offense) to Texas Tech to accelerate the ascent of an improved roster with championship aspirations.
“You’re like, ‘Hey, we’re not rebuilding. You’re coming in and we’ve been in a bowl game the last three years, won two of the three,'” McGuire told ESPN. “‘You need to understand we’re putting all this money in. You’ve got to be ready to go.'”
Meanwhile, Notre Dame is still trying to reach its defensive standard under first-year coordinator Chris Ash.
Five full weeks of the 2025 season have provided enough evidence to evaluate how the first-year coordinators are performing. Here are my nearly midterm grades for coordinators who are shining, struggling or somewhere in between. (Note: I evaluated only coordinators joining returning head coaches, as opposed to those on entirely new staffs.)
After Miami blew leads and allowed a total of 83 points in losses to Syracuse and Iowa State to close the 2024 season, Cristobal made a necessary coordinator change and hired Hetherman, who at Minnesota had overseen the No. 5 total defense and No. 9 scoring defense in the FBS.
Hetherman inherited an undeniably talented group but had to maximize its ability. Established stars such as Rueben Bain Jr. are thriving — 2 sacks, 3.5 tackles for loss, 1 interception, 1 forced fumble — and transfers Mohamed Toure (Rutgers) and Jakobe Thomas (Tennessee) have helped right away.
Miami is bottling up the run, allowing just 2.6 yards per rush with a long of 30 yards. Take away Notre Dame’s 17-point fourth quarter in the opener, and Miami has allowed 29 points in the other 15 quarters it has played.
“He’s an elite teacher, and his care factor, it just screams out of him,” Cristobal told ESPN of Hetherman. “Our guys have learned a lot of football. They’re playing with physicality and playing fast, and communicating at a much higher level. We’re just consistently getting better on that side of the ball.”
Jim Knowles’ departure from the national champion Buckeyes to Big Ten rival Penn State seemed like a real blow, and Ohio State hiring Patricia as his replacement seemed like a head-scratcher. Patricia had not worked in college football since 2003 and last served as a defensive coordinator for the New England Patriots in 2017. Despite winning three Super Bowls with the Patriots, Patricia arrived in Columbus with some question marks.
He made an excellent first impression by guiding the Buckeyes’ defense to a near shutout of Texas and quarterback Arch Manning in the season opener. Texas didn’t score until 3:28 remained, and Manning struggled against Patricia’s scheme. Ohio State’s defense delivered an arguably more impressive performance Saturday at Washington, keeping the Huskies out of the end zone and holding them to 15 first downs and 234 total yards.
Despite inheriting a unit with mostly new starters in the front seven, Patricia has watched Caden Curry, Arvell Reese, Kayden McDonald and others get off to fast starts. The Buckeyes lead the FBS in fewest points allowed (5.5 PPG) and rank eighth in allowing 3.99 yards per play.
“The guys just love Matt,” Ohio State coach Ryan Day told ESPN this spring. “He’s been a defensive coordinator for Super Bowl teams. He’s been an offensive [assistant]. He’s been very much involved, like a GM. One of the reasons why we brought him in was because of his background of doing multiple things on defense that fit the skill set of the guys that we have.”
Linebacker Sonny Styles echoed Day, saying of Patricia, “He’s able to adapt to whatever personnel he has. You get to experience a lot of different things, and you get to display a multiplicity of abilities.”
The offseason buzz at Texas Tech revolved around its portal additions and the cost to bring them in, but the new playcallers McGuire would hire also impacted an all-in season for the Red Raiders. He had to replace offensive coordinator Zach Kittley, who became the youngest head coach (33) in the FBS when he left for Florida Atlantic. Texas Tech also needed a new coordinator for a defense that had slipped to 126th nationally in yards allowed and 121st in points allowed.
“I wanted a guy that was a multiple, that wasn’t just a three-down guy, wasn’t just a four-down guy, who could fit our current players in and then the guys we were going to bring in,” McGuire said. “And I wanted somebody extremely detailed and organized. If anybody asks me what Shiel Wood is like, I’d say he’s extremely detailed and organized and then, boom, he’s got all kinds of juice for the players to rally around.”
Leftwich is a lifelong Texan who never worked at Texas Tech but had links to the school and the Mike Leach Air Raid legacy through Eric Morris, whom Leftwich worked under at Incarnate Word. Like Kittley, Leftwich is young (30) but accomplished and is working with a mix of returnees, including quarterback Behren Morton, and several notable offensive line transfers. Texas Tech is averaging 52 points per game and 7.8 yards per play.
“I wanted to still keep our Texas Tech identity whenever it comes to offense, but also, there’s so many little additions to what he does that makes it really tough to defend,” McGuire said. “One thing that makes Mack different, you’ve got some of the wide splits like Art [Briles] used to do at Baylor. You got some run-and-shoot and the stuff we do. Then, at the end of the day, his dad’s an offensive line coach, so he’ll tell you, we don’t run the football, he’s not welcome to Thanksgiving.”
Norvell wasn’t going to give up offensive playcalling to just anybody. Malzahn mentored Norvell early in his coaching career, and the chance to reunite at Florida State made sense for both.
The Malzahn move paid off right away as Florida State consistently stayed a step ahead of Alabama in a 31-17 upset to open the season. FSU averaged 6.1 yards per play and converted 5 of 12 third-down chances and both of its fourth-down opportunities, including a fourth-and-1 from the Seminoles’ 34-yard line with a 7-point lead in the fourth quarter.
Florida State is averaging 53 points per game and 8.2 yards per play under Malzahn, whose creativeness has repeatedly shown up. There were some missteps in Friday’s loss at Virginia, as Florida State committed three turnovers and couldn’t convert several opportunities in Cavaliers territory. But Malzahn’s usage of quarterback Tommy Castellanos, wide receiver Duce Robinson and others has been effective.
The Beck-Devon Dampier package deal from New Mexico didn’t generate as much national attention as the Arbuckle-Mateer pairing at Oklahoma, but it had the potential to be just as significant, given Utah’s offensive struggles the past two seasons. Under Beck, Dampier earned first-team All-Mountain West honors in 2024 and led the league in both total offense (3,934 yards) and yards per carry (7.52).
“Me and my defensive coordinator, Morgan Scalley, who’s the head coach-in-waiting, conducted a national search, and when all was said and done, we both were on the exact same page: This is the guy,” head coach Kyle Whittingham said of Beck this summer. “Then, when Devon expressed interest to transfer by going in the portal, we said, ‘It’s natural, it’s a natural fit. Two for one.'”
The Sooners looked to the Palouse and Washington State to fix their slumping offense, adding Arbuckle and quarterback Mateer in the top offseason package deal. Arbuckle was just 27 when he landed the OC job at WSU, becoming the youngest coordinator in the Power 5 at the time. He helped develop Cam Ward and Mateer, lightly recruited quarterbacks from his native state of Texas, into national stars.
“He’s done a fantastic job from leadership, energy, developing an identity,” coach Brent Venables said of Arbuckle. “He’s a tough guy, demands great discipline and accountability, brings out the best in our guys, knows what he wants to do.”
The Malzahn move made waves throughout the sport because power-conference head coaches rarely leave for coordinator spots, but Florida State’s hiring of White also qualified as a significant coup. White had performed well at Nebraska, an ascending program, but left to try to revive an FSU team that had slipped to 87th nationally in points allowed.
Like Malzahn, White had an immediate effect. White comes from the Rocky Long coaching tree and employs a variation of Long’s 3-3-5 scheme. Florida State was the more physical defense in the opening win against Alabama, holding the Tide to 87 rushing yards while allowing just 6 of 17 third-down conversions and 2 of 5 fourth-down conversions.