Adam RittenbergDec 2, 2025, 09:17 AM ETCloseCollege football reporter; joined ESPN in 2008. Graduate of Northwestern University.Follow on X
play0:32Paul Finebaum: Is Virginia Tech an upgrade for James Franklin?Paul Finebaum weighs in on James Franklin reportedly being hired as Virginia Tech’s next coach.
Lane Kiffin to LSU, Pete Golding to lead Ole Miss (0:51)Adam Rittenberg reacts to Lane Kiffin’s decision to take LSU’s job and Ole Miss replacing Kiffin with defensive coordinator Pete Golding. (0:51)
Paul Finebaum: Is Virginia Tech an upgrade for James Franklin?Paul Finebaum weighs in on James Franklin reportedly being hired as Virginia Tech’s next coach.
Stanford hires former Cardinal QB Tavita Pritchard as coach
Schools around the Power 4 that fired their coaches in the first two months of the season — or, in Stanford’s case, way back in late March — are targeting candidates and finalizing deals. Interestingly enough, one of the first major coaches to lose his job, Penn State’s James Franklin, was the first noninterim coach to be hired, as he is headed to Virginia Tech.
New hires always come with hope and optimism, grand proclamations and the chance to get programs on the right track. But not all hiring processes are the same. The financial component with jobs is essential — what schools are willing to spend not just on their head coach, but the assistants and support staff and, perhaps most important, the team roster.
We will be reviewing all of the major coaching hires in the 2025-26 cycle, evaluating how each coach fits in the job, their major challenges and what it will take to be successful. We will also assign an initial letter grade for each hire.
Jump to: Kentucky | Michigan State | UCLA | LSU | Ole Miss | Florida | Arkansas Auburn | Stanford | Oklahoma State | Virginia Tech
Northwestern never recovered after Fitzgerald fired longtime offensive coordinator Mick McCall in 2019 and veteran defensive coordinator Mike Hankwitz retired in 2020. The Wildcats won four games combined in 2021-22. The Big Ten is also different from when Fitzgerald last coached. Oregon, Washington and USC — combined with the emergence of Indiana — have made the Big Ten that much tougher for programs like Northwestern and Michigan State. — Jake Trotter
When Foster was hired to be UCLA’s next head coach after Chip Kelly’s departure, the challenge was making UCLA attractive again. The Bruins opted for familiarity with a former player and first-time head coach and it backfired. Now, they’ve gone outside the box to a coach who hasn’t spent any time on the West Coast. There lies Chesney’s biggest challenge.
UCLA may not be able to immediately recruit or use the transfer portal with the likes of USC and Oregon on this side of the college football world, but Chesney has the pedigree of being able to develop players at lower levels and win wherever he has been. How he can harness that into not only excitement around the program, but also substance and results will be crucial.
It never quite felt like Foster was able to do just that, and though interim Tim Skipper did infuse life into the team after Foster’s firing, this is a program that needs a clear, viable and effective long-term directive. The question is whether Chesney can concoct the right recipe to turn a fledgling brand into more than just a Big Ten also-ran. — Paolo Uggetti
Although Golding has shown his talents in recruiting and with schematics, how will he handle the media? How does he do in front of donors and other key stakeholders with the university? Perhaps he just needed the chance, which he now has, but assistant coaches that are shielded from the media often take some time to get fully comfortable.
He has led Memphis since late 2019 but has been at the program since 2016, so he understands the recruiting landscape and where Arkansas must look for players. Arkansas’ location can be a challenge for acquiring talent, but Silverfield shouldn’t be intimidated by it. He also brings a strong background on offense to Fayetteville and should compile a staff that has similar knowledge to the area and possibly the SEC.
Silverfield’s consistency and success tended to go under the radar at a program such as Memphis, where people have grown accustomed to really strong seasons. But his steady leadership style, shown in 2023, 2024 and most of this year, should help an Arkansas program that needs clear direction. He hasn’t coached in the SEC, and there could be a learning curve, but he shouldn’t be surprised walking in the door at Arkansas after spending so much time with Memphis. — Rittenberg
Golesh also brings an offensive background that should energize Auburn fans, especially after how poorly things went on that side of the ball under Freeze. Golesh spent time with Matt Campbell early in his career then with Josh Heupel at both UCF and Tennessee. South Florida ranks in the top five nationally in both scoring and total offense this season, and its defense shined in wins against Boise State and Florida.
Pritchard, 38, was part of Stanford’s seismic shift under Jim Harbaugh, quarterbacking the team to a signature win against USC in 2007. He then witnessed Stanford’s rise to a consistent contender and, more importantly, saw how things went downhill so quickly after COVID and in the portal/NIL era. His ability to learn from those difficult times and ensure Stanford avoids them will be important. But again, he’s not doing this alone, as he comes in immediately aligned with Luck. — Rittenberg
Generating momentum. Few people share as close an association with some of the biggest moments in Stanford history as Pritchard, but during those heights, the Cardinal never truly resonated broadly within a competitive San Francisco Bay Area sports market. With the collapse of the Pac-12 and six losing seasons in the past seven years, Stanford football has essentially become irrelevant locally. Building a program under those circumstances is difficult.
Beyond the structural challenges, this is just a team that needs a talent upgrade. They don’t have the players right now to compete at a high level. — Kyle Bonagura
Morris played and coached in the Big 12 at Texas Tech and spent time at Houston early in his career, so he won’t be unfamiliar with the key characteristics of a program like Oklahoma State. He’s not a Gundy disciple, but he can respect what Gundy did to elevate the program, while implementing his own vision, which worked both at Incarnate Word and at North Texas. — Rittenberg
The answer here is twofold: 1) Morris must live up to the unprecedented levels of consistent success his predecessor brought Oklahoma State; 2) Morris will also have to figure out exactly how to take the Cowboys’ football program to the future.
Morris is only 40 (cue the Gundy memes), hasn’t been a Power 4 head coach, and before this season had only middling results with North Texas. His quarterback track record is his superpower, though, and Oklahoma State needs a renaissance at the position after things fell off too sharply. Morris can recruit Texas and build up the roster. Time will tell if he has the expertise to win one-score games in a league where programs are extremely similar. — Rittenberg
Paul Finebaum: Is Virginia Tech an upgrade for James Franklin?
Paul Finebaum weighs in on James Franklin reportedly being hired as Virginia Tech’s next coach.
When Franklin was fired and almost immediately announced his intentions to coach in 2026, Virginia Tech emerged as a natural landing spot for the 53-year-old. He has spent most of his career near the mid-Atlantic region, twice serving as a Maryland assistant, leading programs in Vanderbilt and Penn State and even working within the state at James Madison in 1997.
Virginia Tech’s two post-Frank Beamer hires were a coach who had not led a Power 4 program (Justin Fuente) and a first-time head coach (Brent Pry). In Franklin, Virginia Tech gets a proven winner from the Big Ten and SEC, who knows the region extremely well and will be extremely motivated to compete for league titles and CFP appearances.
Franklin’s big-stage shortcomings are a concern but perhaps not as much for a program like Virginia Tech, which is seeking to become a consistent conference title contender again. — Rittenberg
He also gives Kentucky a vision for the offense that it needs after the past few seasons. Since the start of the 2022 season, Kentucky ranks 115th nationally in scoring and 101st in total offense. Stein has quickly emerged as one of the sport’s top playcallers, and has won with different quarterbacks, from the record-setting Frank Harris at UTSA to Bo Nix, Dillon Gabriel and now Dante Moore at Oregon. He operates a system that should attract talented offensive players to Lexington. Stein also has been around strong mentors, from Jeff Traylor to Dan Lanning.
Stein has shown he can handle quarterbacks and design offensive game plans, but how ready is he to oversee an SEC program? He has made a quick rise after landing his first on-field job in the FBS in 2020. The SEC is seemingly getting deeper by the year and can be merciless to coaches and programs that aren’t buttoned-down in every aspect. Stein will need to compile a strong staff, especially on defense but also with a veteran mentor or two. He must take the best elements of coaches like Lanning and Traylor, and apply them as he shapes his own program.
The other big challenge is personnel and upgrading Kentucky’s talent level, ideally with greater resources than Stoops had at the end of his tenure. Stein’s childhood connection to Kentucky and personality should get donors and fans engaged, but the program has fallen behind operationally as teams like Vanderbilt and Missouri have accelerated. Athletics director Mitch Barnhart and university president Eli Capilouto have been in their roles a long time, but they’re also nearing the ends of their careers. Stein must push both leaders to help him get what he needs, especially during the first 12-18 months of his tenure.