NCAAF · 2 months ago

College Football’s Worst Coaches of 2025: Ranking the Bottom 15

TJ Inman

Host · Writer

15. Mike Norvell - Florida State Seminoles
For the second-straight season, the Florida State Seminoles were one of the most disappointing teams in the country. The Seminoles supposedly have plenty of talent, and that was on full display in the season opener against Alabama, when they blasted the Crimson Tide, and then followed that up with blowout wins over East Texas A&M and Kent State. Mike Norvell’s team rose to 3-0, and FSU fans were thumping their chests that they were back in the driver’s seat in the ACC. The fun did not last, and things careened back into a ditch quickly as they went to Virginia and lost 46-38. That was followed by losses to Miami and Pittsburgh, and an inexcusable defeat to Stanford that extended the ACC losing streak to nine games before they beat Wake Forest. FSU finished 5-7, and the financial reality of Norvell’s buyout is the only thing keeping him employed in Tallahassee for another season.

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1. Mike Gundy - Oklahoma State Cowboys
Mike Gundy entered the 2025 season as the second-longest tenured head coach in collegiate football (trailing only Iowa's Kirk Ferentz). Still, his era in Stillwater had turned stale long before he began his 21st season as the head coach of the Oklahoma State Cowboys. Recruiting had fallen off a cliff, and Gundy struggled to adapt to the transfer portal and NIL era. After just three games, the Oklahoma State administration pulled the trigger and fired its longtime coach. Those three games included a win over UT-Martin, an embarrassing 69-3 loss to Oregon, and then a stunning defeat to in-state foe Tulsa. Doug Meacham was the interim coach for the remainder of the season, and things got no better as Oklahoma State lost its final 11 games and was outscored 170 to 400. Former North Texas coach Eric Morris is now in charge and has his work cut out for him.

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2. Trent Dilfer - UAB Blazers
After going just 9-21 in two and a half seasons as the head coach at UAB, Trent Dilfer was fired on October 12 after falling to 2-4 on the season. Alex Mortensen took over as interim coach and led the Blazers to a pair of wins as the Blazers finished 4-8. Dilfer's tenure was a big swing by UAB. They surprisingly hired him after seeing success under Bill Clark and interim coach Bryant Vincent, while Dilfer had no collegiate experience and was a high school coach in Nashville. They were last in the American Athletic Conference (AAC) in scoring defense when he was canned. Dilfer blamed the UAB administration and said in an interview that it was difficult "working with people that didn't see winning, like I did." He might care a lot about winning, but he didn't do nearly enough of it during his brief foray into college coaching.
4. Brent Pry - Virginia Tech Hokies
Brent Pry barely survived the 2024 season with a win over rival Virginia in the regular season finale, likely saving his job and giving him a chance to build in 2025. Pry brought in a new defensive coordinator, and there were hopes that the Hokies could be competitive in the ACC this season. However, they lost to South Carolina in the season opener and then got pushed around by the Vanderbilt Commodores in Blacksburg in the home opener. Things reached a boiling point in their third game as the Old Dominion Monarchs ran all over Pry's Hokies, and the home team was booed off the field in the 45-26 defeat to the in-state foe. Pry was fired, and the team rallied to win a pair of ACC games and finish 3-9. Former Penn State head coach James Franklin is now tasked with rescuing the once-proud program.
5. Sam Pittman/Bobby Petrino - Arkansas Razorbacks
The Arkansas Razorbacks were, quite possibly, the best 2-10 team in college football history. How’s that for a backhanded compliment? Sam Pittman entered the season in one of the country’s hottest seats, and a blowout loss to Notre Dame sealed his fate and gave us interim coach Bobby Petrino. Arkansas lost by six points to Ole Miss, one point to Memphis, three points to Tennessee, Texas A&M, and Mississippi State, and was 0-6 in one-score games. There was talent in Fayetteville, but the coaching staff was unable to get them a single win against a power-conference opponent.
6. Phil Longo - Sam Houston Bearkats
Sam Houston is a proud program, and the Bearkats won ten games before K.C. Keeler bolted to Temple. Phil Longo was hired, and the deck was stacked against him, but they were even worse than the most pessimistic projections, losing nine games by more than 14 points en route to a 2-10 season.
7. Billy Napier - Florida Gators
If you surveyed fans ahead of the 2025 season and asked them which coach was most likely to be fired, Florida’s Billy Napier would have been among the most likely choices. Injuries throughout the offseason prevented quarterback DJ Lagway from practicing with the team, and things seemed doomed from the very start. The Gators had talent but stumbled to a 3-4 start, including defeats to in-state foes South Florida and Miami. Napier was fired, and the losses only mounted under the interim coach, leading the Gators to turn to Jon Sumrall to restore the program.
8. Trent Bray - Oregon State Beavers
The Oregon State Beavers were in a brutal spot after the dissolution of the PAC-12, but things went far worse than expected under head coach Trent Bray. Bray took over for Jonathan Smith (Michigan State), and the program fell apart with Bray being fired and the Beavers going 2-10 and finishing 124th in S&P+. Washington State is in a very similar position and managed to tread water at 7-6. Still, the Beavers were outscored 218-353 and suffered ugly losses to Cal, Fresno State, Appalachian State, Tulsa, and even Sam Houston. Energetic young coach JaMarcus Shepherd has a lot of work cut out for him in Corvallis.
9. Jonathan Smith - Michigan State Spartans
The Michigan State Spartans are not a poverty program, but they turned to former Oregon State head coach after going 9-15 in the previous two seasons. Jonathan Smith went exactly 9-15, and the Spartans were treading water near the bottom of the Big Ten while their fans watched rivals Michigan and Ohio State win national titles, and IU play for one on January 19. Smith was fired after failing to gain any ground in East Lansing, and former Northwestern head coach Pat Fitzgerald was hired to turn things around.
10. Deion Sanders - Colorado Buffaloes
This was entirely predictable, but many thought Deion Sanders was really building a program in Boulder and that 2025 would be a step forward after the nine-win season in 2024. Turns out that losing two defining stars without a coach who has proven capable of elevating his team above its talent level is not actually a recipe for positive outcomes. The Buffaloes got poor play from every quarterback they tried, demoted the offensive coordinator again, and finished 3-9 with a whole lot of blowout losses. Colorado is trying to live in the transfer portal almost exclusively, but Coach Prime is not finding a winning formula.
11. Fran Brown - Syracuse Orange
The Syracuse Orange looked like a program on the rise in 2024, and head coach Fran Brown was generating lots of attention for the work he was doing on the recruiting trail. The former Georgia assistant had his team poised to move to 3-1 before quarterback Steve Angeli was injured. The Orange wrapped up a win against Clemson, but looked like one of the worst teams in the country for the rest of the season. They lost every game after that and averaged only 11 points per game, as no matter who they tried at quarterback, they struggled mightily. Brown lashed out at his team in the media and looked out of his depth in blowout losses to Duke, Georgia Tech, Miami, and Notre Dame. They even lost to North Carolina and Boston College embarrassingly. Can Brown turn this around in Year 3?
12. Bill O'Brien - Boston College Eagles
Speaking of Boston College, that season-ending win over Syracuse was the lone bright spot for head coach Bill O’Brien in Chestnut Hill. After a 7-6 season in his first year in charge, Boston College sputtered to a 2-10 record in 2025, was outscored 166-278 in ACC play, and had the worst defense in a conference full of poor defenses. They were more competitive down the stretch and got the win over Syracuse, but a lot of their better players have already hit the transfer portal, and there’s not much reason for optimism moving forward.
13. Barry Odom - Purdue Boilermakers
Barry Odom inherited a mess in West Lafayette, but things did not improve much in 2025, and Purdue is still sitting in the basement of the Big Ten and is as poor as any power conference program in the country. The Boilermakers finished the season at 2-10 and were outscored in Big Ten play 130 to 309. Only Rutgers was worse on defense, and only Wisconsin was worse on offense. Purdue lost their final ten games and was blown out multiple times, and those results came with a mostly veteran roster that Odom gambled could be competitive immediately. That gamble failed, and they are facing another roster reset heading into 2026.
14. Tim Albin - Charlotte 49ers
A rough first season for Tim Albin at Charlotte was expected, but no one thought things would be quite as bad as what the 49ers put on the field in 2025. They lost the season’s final nine games and finished 1-11 with a 0-8 record in the American Athletic Conference. Albin was viewed as a coach who knew how to sustain a good program at Ohio, and the hope was that he could take those culture-building fundamentals and instill them at Charlotte. The early results make those hopes look woefully off the mark. The lone win came against Monmouth, and nearly all of the defeats in the long active losing streak were non-competitive.
15. Mike Norvell - Florida State Seminoles
For the second-straight season, the Florida State Seminoles were one of the most disappointing teams in the country. The Seminoles supposedly have plenty of talent, and that was on full display in the season opener against Alabama, when they blasted the Crimson Tide, and then followed that up with blowout wins over East Texas A&M and Kent State. Mike Norvell’s team rose to 3-0, and FSU fans were thumping their chests that they were back in the driver’s seat in the ACC. The fun did not last, and things careened back into a ditch quickly as they went to Virginia and lost 46-38. That was followed by losses to Miami and Pittsburgh, and an inexcusable defeat to Stanford that extended the ACC losing streak to nine games before they beat Wake Forest. FSU finished 5-7, and the financial reality of Norvell’s buyout is the only thing keeping him employed in Tallahassee for another season.

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1. Mike Gundy - Oklahoma State Cowboys
Mike Gundy entered the 2025 season as the second-longest tenured head coach in collegiate football (trailing only Iowa's Kirk Ferentz). Still, his era in Stillwater had turned stale long before he began his 21st season as the head coach of the Oklahoma State Cowboys. Recruiting had fallen off a cliff, and Gundy struggled to adapt to the transfer portal and NIL era. After just three games, the Oklahoma State administration pulled the trigger and fired its longtime coach. Those three games included a win over UT-Martin, an embarrassing 69-3 loss to Oregon, and then a stunning defeat to in-state foe Tulsa. Doug Meacham was the interim coach for the remainder of the season, and things got no better as Oklahoma State lost its final 11 games and was outscored 170 to 400. Former North Texas coach Eric Morris is now in charge and has his work cut out for him.

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College Football’s Worst Coaches of 2025: Ranking the Bottom 15

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