The football offseason and the impending return of the NCAA Tournament bring about one of the staples of online college sports content: combined football and basketball coaching rankings. This is comfort food for bloggers. Badgers Wire editor Ben Kenney, a Wisconsin writer and podcaster, dove into Big Ten football and basketball coaching rankings with USC and other schools joining the Big Ten to create an 18-team superleague in 2024.
The Lincoln Riley-Andy Enfield combination did not even make Kenney’s top 10. Combinations placed ahead of USC include UCLA, with DeShaun Foster as a head football coach who hasn’t coached a game yet, and Ohio State, with fired coach Chris Holtmann listed as the basketball boss for the Buckeyes. Nebraska also makes the list with Matt Rhule and Fred Hoiberg.
Here’s the contradiction with the list. Some choices — such as Foster for UCLA and Northwestern’s David Braun, are based on potential more than past achievement. Braun has coached only one season, Foster none. There is a belief that they will be good coaches at their schools. On the other hand, Rhule, Holtmann, and a few other named coaches make the list because of past achievements. Rhule hasn’t yet made a bowl game at Nebraska. He’s on the list because of the amazing work he did at Temple and especially Baylor. Holtmann just got fired. Fran McCaffery at Iowa is going to miss the NCAA Tournament this season. Is this list measuring future potential or past achievements? It’s hard to tell.
If we’re going strictly by past achievements, there is absolutely no way Lincoln Riley — with three College Football Playoff appearances and four conference championships plus three Heisman Trophy winners — shouldn’t join Andy Enfield, a man with five NCAA Tournaments (six if you count 2020) and an Elite Eight appearance, in the top 10. USC has to be somewhere in there, but it isn’t.
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