I want to take you all back to January 2025.
The Arizona State Sun Devils just completed an improbable run to the College Football Playoff only two years removed from the disastrous Herm Edwards era.
Head coach Kenny Dillingham, in only his second year on the job, had guided the program through NCAA sanctions and three-win seasons to a Big 12 championship and had his team on the precipice of a Playoff win over Texas thanks to the contributions of exciting players like Cam Skattebo, Jordyn Tyson, and Sam Leavitt.
Just two years later and the Sun Devils now sit at 2-2 with an anemic offense, fresh off a beatdown at the hands of Baylor, a team currently employing a coach who was on a ridiculously hot seat himself just a month earlier.
Less than a year after Arizona State’s magical CFP appearance, two more coaches were making names for themselves at schools on opposite ends of the country.
Jedd Fisch inherited a Washington program in 2024 that had just competed for a national championship the season prior to his arrival, but had to replace almost 100% of the team’s production from a year earlier.
After a 6-7 campaign that year showed promise, Fisch followed that up with a nine-win season that included a bowl win over Boise State and featured a quarterback by the name of Demond Williams who was the toast of college football.
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Meanwhile, more than 2,600 miles to the southeast, Brent Key was turning Georgia Tech into a legitimate threat in the ACC with a super innovative offense and a Heisman hopeful by the name of Haynes King at quarterback.
The Yellow Jackets climbed to as high as number seven in the AP Poll, their highest mark in nearly two decades, and even finished the season ranked for the first time since 2014.
Ten months later, and both Washington and Georgia Tech – along with the aforementioned Sun Devils – look like shells of their former selves from just a season ago.
It happens. These schools are not built to contend for more than a season or two in a row without sharp fluctuations year-to-year.
While programs like Ohio State, Texas, Oregon, and Georgia have the infrastructure, funding, and talent pipelines to be consistently great year in and year out, the Washingtons, Georgia Techs, and Arizona States of the world need to capitalize on razor thin windows and go “all in” whenever they recognize those windows are approaching.
That goes for their coaches, too.
There was a time when Dillingham, Fisch, and Key were being linked to every major job in college football following their respective “window years.”
Dillingham was talked about as Mike Norvell’s potential replacement at Florida State following their abysmal 2024 season, and the 36-year-old head coach was even discussed for the Michigan job shortly after they fired Sherrone Moore.
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Speaking of the Maize and Blue, Fisch was also thought to be the leader in the clubhouse to take the job in Ann Arbor, and both he and Key were heavily considered as candidates for the opening at Florida, with Fisch getting extra attention given his alumni status in Gainesville.
These three coaches were some of the hottest names in the last two hiring cycles, and for whatever reason, they chose to stay at their respective spots.
There’s no shame in that, and for Dillingham and Key, it could also come down to the fact that they are coaching at their alma maters.
But the question remains: did they miss their chance to parlay their successful seasons into jobs at bigger, more established programs?
If Washington, Arizona State, and Georgia Tech all finish with six or seven losses each this season, their respective coaches likely won’t be fielding many calls when high-level jobs come open in November.
Perhaps they’re happy where they are now, although Dillingham has specifically called out Arizona State’s fanbase and booster clubs about a lack of funding in the past, and based on conversations I’ve had with people close to the Gators’ football program regarding the Florida job, it’s one that Fisch would readily take under the right circumstances.
Time will tell for all three of these coaches, as well as others who are making a name for themselves at the “mid-tier” Power 4 programs.
Maybe one of these three will win 10 or 11 games in 2027 and land a tier-one job to make me look like a fool.
It worked for Matt Campbell, who had multiple historic seasons at Iowa State in 2020 and 2024 only to turn down other offers.
It was only after Penn State came calling a year later that Campbell finally decided to leave the comfort of Ames.
Patience is a virtue, as is loyalty, but when it comes to being a college football coach, sometimes those things can come back to bite you in the rear end.
You’re only as good as your latest season, and a lot of these hiring athletic directors have a bad case of recency bias when it comes to selecting their next football coach.
I’ll be interested to see where Kenny Dillingham, Brent Key, and Jedd Fisch are a year from today.
Will they be settling in at cushy new jobs in Tallahassee, Los Angeles, and Norman?
Or will they be the latest victims of the “what have you done for me lately” league that is Power 4 college football?
There’s only one way to find out.
