Adam RittenbergDec 28, 2025, 08:00 AM ETCloseCollege football reporter; joined ESPN in 2008. Graduate of Northwestern University.Follow on X
EJ Manuel previews the path to CFP quarterfinal upsets (1:42)EJ Manuel gives the keys to victory for the College Football Playoff quarterfinal underdogs. (1:42)
THE PHONE BUZZED and the voice on the other end sounded characteristically upbeat and cheerful, but also a bit worn down.
Collin Klein was a week away from calling offensive plays for Texas A&M in the school’s first College Football Playoff game, facing Miami at Kyle Field. For coordinators, especially those like Klein at a top program such as Texas A&M, calling plays in the CFP is the ultimate responsibility. Crafting call sheets and game plans for the playoff are worth every waking hour of their energy and focus.
“It’s just very strange and different,” Klein told ESPN. “The difference of hats is pretty stark. One day, you’re doing one job. The next day, you go to the next one. You’re like, ‘Wait a minute. Is this even real?'”
There were also four primary coordinators for CFP teams — Klein, Oregon offensive coordinator Will Stein, Oregon defensive coordinator Tosh Lupoi and Ohio State offensive coordinator Brian Hartline — simultaneously balancing their first FBS head coach opportunities. Stein is going to Kentucky, Lupoi to Cal and Hartline to South Florida.
“It’s such a strange calendar, and the timing is brutal,” Day said Monday. “But he’s handled it great, as you can imagine. It’s a lot on his plate. It’s a lot to manage.”
LUPOI KEPT A strict routine when game-planning for Oregon’s CFP first-round matchup against James Madison. He placed his cell phone in a cabinet, out of sight or earshot, while he focused on practice, playcalls or film review.
He took a similar approach toward the coaching carousel during the regular season. If teams or intermediaries wanted to talk, Lupoi carved out time Thursday nights, typically the only night off during game week. That was it.
“Compartmentalizing your time is really important,” Lupoi said. “It’s enormous for me, writing things down and making sure I accomplish those things, and sticking to that. By doing that, you’re going to hurt some people’s feelings by not texting them back or not calling them back. I look at it as, every 10 seconds, every 20 seconds of conversations or text messages, that ultimately adds up, and I might have two hours away from the priority at hand.”
Klein then began hiring his staff. He hoped to maintain as much sensible roster continuity as he could, while being mindful, as all new head coaches are, of the transfer portal opening Jan. 2. While at Texas A&M, Klein would check in daily with his K-State assistants, and said he benefited from taking a head coaching job at a place he knows extremely well.
“The biggest thing is not just even multitasking, but just, ‘OK, whatever’s in front of me this second, I’ve got to kill that and then knock that out of the park, and then whatever the next one is,'” Klein said. “Just try to live in the now as much as you possibly can because that’s all that you can do.”
Former Alabama coach Nick Saban had a series of coordinators accept major jobs while the team was annually in the four-team CFP. Defensive coordinator Kirby Smart (Georgia) began the string of double-duty coordinators in 2015, followed by Kiffin (Florida Atlantic) in 2016, DC Jeremy Pruitt (Tennessee) in 2017 and OC Mike Locksley (Maryland) in 2018. Offensive coordinator Steve Sarkisian landed the Texas job in early 2021, days before the Tide played for the national championship.
Some double-duty situations panned out. Smart, Pruitt and Sarkisian all helped Alabama to national titles before moving on. But it didn’t always go well. After Alabama’s offense struggled in a CFP semifinal win over Washington in late 2016, Saban dismissed Kiffin and appointed Sarkisian, then an Alabama analyst, as playcaller for the national title game. The offense performed better, but Alabama lost 35-31 to Clemson in a memorable championship clash.
Ohio State could be employing a similar strategy while keeping Hartline on staff. Three days after South Florida announced Hartline as its head coach, Ohio State recorded season lows for points (10) and rushing yards (58) in a loss to Indiana in the Big Ten championship game.
“Ultimately, it will be my decision of what calls go into the game,” Day said. “Kind of wanted to take that off of Brian’s plate, as we head into the playoffs, because he has so much going on.”
Locskley joined Alabama’s staff in 2016 and had witnessed the Kiffin situation and what followed with Pruitt during the 2017-18 CFP. Maryland hired him Dec. 4, 2018.
Maryland signed only two recruits in the early period, and Locksley hired just one or two assistants to be with his new program. He deferred the bulk of staff and roster construction until after the national championship game against Clemson on Jan. 7, 2019.
Locksley’s thought was that going all-in on the national championship would not only help Alabama but also Maryland in the long run.
“I don’t think there’s a perfect way to do it, other than my mantra was work for the job I have, and not for the one I’m going to,” Locksley said. “Because what will help me at the place I’m going is if I win and take advantage of being on TV and the things that being a part of a championship run can do for your future program.”
Locksley had overseen the nation’s No. 3 scoring offense that fall, and Alabama’s success continued in a CFP semifinal win over Oklahoma, when the Tide piled up 45 points and 528 yards. Alabama rolled into the title game at 14-0, but generated a season-low 16 points and converted just 4 of 13 third-down opportunities in a blowout loss to Clemson.
“Somewhere, there’s a fine balance between what I did compared to maybe what I saw Lane and Jeremy, kind of hiring coaches and having to do both, wear two hats,” Locksley said. “For me, it obviously didn’t work that great in the championship game. Probably played the worst game we played. But I wouldn’t say it was because of me taking the Maryland job, because I actually didn’t do very much work on Maryland while I was preparing.”
Locksley added that his approach then likely wouldn’t work today, as coaches immediately influence their future rosters through the portal. Staff hires they make, even while finishing their coordinator duties, can bring along players with them.
The realities of the calendar require double-duty coaches to devote some portions of their days — or late nights — to the future, even as they remain focused on the next game.
“Giving these players in [Oregon’s] organization everything I’ve got in the approach, and then having a few energy drinks and a coffee at night, resetting and getting involved [at Cal],” Lupoi said.
As an Alabama staff member from 2014 through 2018, Lupoi witnessed all the two-job maneuvering firsthand. He and Stein also benefit from a current boss, Dan Lanning, who landed the Oregon job in late 2021 while serving as Georgia’s defensive coordinator during the team’s national title push.
“It’s not easy,” Stein said. “Dan has done it before, so I’m leaning on him. Tosh is in it as well. … If you let it get to you, it could be an issue. I’ve chosen not to let it get to me and focus on the task at hand, and when I need to delegate to the University of Kentucky, I do that. But when I’m here at Oregon, in the building, all focus is on the Ducks.”
THE CFP HAS become the deciding factor for coaches who land other opportunities after the regular season. Coaches on teams bound for bowl games but not the CFP — such as Iowa State Matt Campbell (Penn State), South Florida’s Alex Golesh (Auburn) and Memphis’ Ryan Silverfield (Arkansas) — have made immediate moves. When Michigan offensive coordinator Chip Lindsey landed the same role at Missouri, he didn’t stick around for the Wolverines’ bowl game.
But those working for CFP teams don’t want to exit the championship chase. Even Kiffin tried to remain with Ole Miss through the playoff before fully focusing on LSU. Although that possibility quickly faded because he left for a conference rival, several of his top assistants, already working for LSU, are also helping Ole Miss prepare for a CFP quarterfinal matchup against another SEC team, Georgia.
For coordinators such as Stein and Lupoi, the thought of starting their new jobs before they finished their current ones was, well, a nonstarter. Even though Hartline won’t be Ohio State’s primary playcaller for the CFP, he’s staying with his alma mater as it tries to win back-to-back national championships.
“I would feel like a complete fraud if I left these guys throughout this playoff run, this opportunity in front of us, it would honestly be crazy,” Stein said. “And Tosh is the same way. We poured so much of our lives, so much of our time, our family’s time, into this team and this program. Coach Lanning gave me an opportunity from UTSA. The last thing I would ever do would be to leave these players.”
The dual-jobs period requires superior organizational skills, discipline and delegation, and plenty of caffeine, but Stein and Lupoi hope it lasts another three weeks.
“I made it very clear: Over my dead body would I ever leave the individuals here,” Lupoi said. “I want to finish what we started.”
But Klein also was nine days into his tenure as Kansas State head coach, the ultimate dream job for a Wildcats legend who was the quarterback for the K-State team that won the Big 12 championship and reached the Fiesta Bowl in 2012, while becoming a Heisman Trophy finalist. When Klein left Kansas State’s campus in late 2023 after seven seasons as an assistant, he was expected to return as head coach. Now, he had that job, at just 36 years old, but couldn’t get back because he had to finish his other gig, which merely required him to coach in the biggest game of his career.
The reality is that college football’s postseason, including the CFP, clashes with its coaching carousel, which places a growing group of coaches, like Klein, in enviable but hectic spots. This year’s 12-team CFP field included two head coaches, Tulane’s Jon Sumrall and James Madison’s Bob Chesney, who both already accepted other jobs, at Florida and UCLA, respectively. A group of ex-Ole Miss assistants joining former Rebels coach Lane Kiffin at LSU, which includes offensive coordinator Charlie Weis, is remaining with Ole Miss through its CFP run.