College Football Hot Seat Coaches: Win NOW, Or Else
These five coaches will likely hang on to their respective jobs with an okay final record, but they all need to put together a strong string of wins NOW.
5. Ken Niumatalo, Navy
Up Next: at East Carolina
He has been around since 2007 as the head coach, and the 11-2 season of 2019 is still fresh. However, he’s now 7-17 since then, the loss to Delaware and the blowout defeat at home to Memphis stung, and it doesn’t look like the schedule is going to ease up anytime soon.
The home game against Temple is the only game the Midshipmen will likely be favored in, and now after this start, getting to just three wins – much less to a bowl game – appears to be a long shot.
4. Scott Satterfield, Louisville
Up Next: USF
Satterfield hasn’t been able to build on the 8-5 first season – going 11-16 since – and the 1-2 start to 2022 with two ACC losses hasn’t helped.
The Louisville season – and possibly the Satterfield era – will be made or broken over the next few weeks. The schedule has a few winnable games up next, home games against Wake Forest, Pitt, and NC State, and it all finishes up with Clemson and Kentucky on the road in November.
For now, USC, at Boston College, at Virginia. Satterfield could desperately use a three-game winning streak coming off the tough home loss to Florida State.
3. Bryan Harsin, Auburn
Up Next: Missouri
A disappointing 6-7 first season – even though it was supposed to be a rebuilding year – absolutely no grace period allowed whatsoever, and a collapse late when the Tigers had Alabama dead and almost buried started the problem. A strange offseason made things worse.
He started 2-0 this year, but there was some grousing about the 24-16 win over San Jose State. And the Penn State rolled into town and left with a 41-16 victory in a dominant performance.
This is a must-win week for Harsin – and potentially for Missouri head coach Eliah Drinkwitz. Lose to the other Tigers, and getting to a bowl game might be next to impossible.
2. Geoff Collins, Georgia Tech
Up Next: at UCF
42-0.
Georgia Tech wasn’t supposed to beat Clemson to start the season, and it wasn’t supposed to get by Ole Miss. But to lose at home by 42 and not even have a chance in Year Four with the program isn’t a plus.
He’s now 10-27, didn’t win more than three games in any of his first three seasons, and now that Duke is okay, Georgia Tech will be a double-digit underdog in – potentially – every game the rest of the way.
1. Karl Dorrell, Colorado
Up Next: UCLA
It was a tad bit of a surprise that Herm Edwards was the only coach from the Pac-12 South to be fired on Sunday after a 49-7 loss to Minnesota that could’ve been much, much worse.
This has turned into a shocking disaster at Colorado.
TCU, Air Force, and Minnesota are all good teams, but the football program at Colorado should be strong enough to take at least win two of those.
Instead, the Buffs are 0-3 by a combined score of 128-30 – and, again, it could’ve been a whole lot worse in all three.
Getting rid of Dorrell would be around a $9 million hit, but considering how good Arizona looks now and how bad the Buffs have been, 0-12 isn’t off the board without a massive upset.
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