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College Football’s Best Head Coach-Quarterback Combinations
Grading college football teams with the best head coach and top quarterback combinations. These 10 tandems are the top of the pops.
March 20, 2016
As spring practices roll on, here are college football teams that have the key pieces in place with the best combination of a head coach and top quarterback.
It might just be this easy – which college football teams have the best combination of head coach and quarterback?
Obviously, the evaluation process doesn’t end with two men. If you can’t make stops or protect the franchise behind center, title hopes won’t last beyond Halloween. But there are no more important individuals to a program than the head coach and the quarterback. If those two spots are in good shape, you’re going to win a lot of football games. And the following 10 schools ought to win plenty this season.
10. UCLA: Jim Mora and Josh Rosen
A second year together is going to be beneficial to both Mora and Rosen in 2016, as they inch closer to becoming one of college football’s power couples.
Mora plucked Rosen out of Manhattan Beach, Calif. to be the franchise quarterback that guides the Bruins to their first Pac-12 title in 18 years. Eighteen long seasons. Other than some faux anger directed at the prodigy last summer, the duo is off to a solid start. Rosen was fourth in the league in passing as a true freshman, and should take a quantum leap as long as the receiving corps can be rebuilt on the fly.
9. Michigan: Jim Harbaugh and John O’Korn
If the coach can help the quarterback recapture his 2013 form, the Wolverines will climb much higher when this list is redone at the end of the season.
Harbaugh is more than just one of the game’s top coaches. He’s also one of its best developers of young passers. Witness Iowa transfer Jake Rudock, who ranked second in Big Ten passing efficiency during his only year in Ann Arbor. The Wolverines are banking on a similar trajectory for O’Korn, the Houston import who debuted as a Freshman All-American before being benched a year later. While he’s hardly a sure-thing starter, he’s going to be a key part of the race for the plum gig.
8. Miami: Mark Richt and Brad Kaaya
Hope in Miami starts with the hiring of Richt and continues with the maturation of Kaaya.
The Canes upgraded on the sidelines when they hired Richt to replace Al Golden last December. The program gets an experienced leader who coached in a ton of huge games in the SEC. And unlike the situation he left in Athens, Richt won’t have any question marks under center. Kaaya is about to begin his third season as a starter, having thrown 42 touchdown passes and 17 interceptions so far in his budding career.
7. Houston: Tom Herman and Greg Ward
Herman is one of the hottest young head coaches in college football. In Ward, he has the ideal multi-dimensional threat to help carry out his offensive plans.
In their first season as partners, Herman and Ward helped lead the Cougars to 13 wins, an American title and a New Year’s Six bowl upset of Florida State. And the best may still be ahead in 2016, even after Ward accounted for 38 touchdowns by vexing defenses with his quick feet and his improving passing skills.
6. Ole Miss: Hugh Freeze and Chad Kelly
The last time the Rebels were in such good shape at quarterback, Eli Manning was still an amateur and Peyton was still a Colt.
Freeze, whose Ole Miss teams have improved in each of his four seasons, has done a terrific job handling Kelly. Remember, Kelly arrived in Oxford with a reputation for behavior problems. However, he not only kept his nose clean in 2015, but also threw 31 touchdown passes and spearheaded wins over Alabama, LSU, and Oklahoma State in the Sugar Bowl.
5. Notre Dame: Brian Kelly and Malik Zaire or DeShone Kizer
No one in America boasts a better lefty-righty combination at quarterback than the Irish. Their coaching situation is solid as well.
Kelly has gradually become a fixture in South Bend, winning 55 games and making one national championship appearance in six seasons. One of his main objectives this offseason will be to decide between Zaire and Kizer, both of whom are qualified to pilot the offense. Zaire threw as many touchdowns as incompletions—three—in the opening day blowout of Texas. But a Week 2 ankle injury opened the door for Kizer to perform like an emerging star.
4. Oklahoma: Bob Stoops and Baker Mayfield
At this time last year, the quarterback was undecided and the coach was under scrutiny in Norman. That was then and this is now.
Mayfield played his way into Heisman contention with 43 total touchdowns and 3,700 yards passing, while being one of the driving forces of Oklahoma’s Big 12 championship and playoff berth.
3. Baylor: Art Briles and Seth Russell
Neck injury aside, the collaboration between Briles and Russell got off to a rousing start in 2015.
Briles has never met a quarterback he couldn’t turn into a statistical star, in Waco or any other town. So, it came as no surprise when Russell racked up gaudy numbers before suffering a scary season-ending injury on Oct. 24. Setbacks aside, he should pick up where he left off last fall. Briles’ star continues to be blinding, transforming a one-time laughingstock into a perennial power that’s won at least 10 in four of the past five years.
2. Ohio State: Urban Meyer and J.T. Barrett
The Buckeyes have a ton of work to do this spring. Quarterback, though, is a position with which no one is concerned.
There’ll be plenty of high-profile position battles in Columbus. Unlike last year, quarterback isn’t one of them, which is good news for Barrett and the entire team. Meyer is the second best coach in the country behind Nick Saban. And sans the distractions, Barrett is poised to perform like he did as a rookie in 2014, when he accounted for 45 touchdowns and finished fifth in the Heisman.
1. Clemson: Dabo Swinney and Deshaun Watson
Based on coach and quarterback alone, the Tigers are the early favorite to return to the national championship game.
Swinney and Watson are rising stars on the sidelines and in the huddle, respectively. The former has turned Clemson into a legit powerhouse that won 14 games in 2015 and came within a touchdown of winning the national title. Swinney recruits remarkably well, beating out a slew of contenders for Watson two years ago. No. 4 took flight as a sophomore, accounting for 47 touchdowns. And there’s no reason to believe he won’t be even more lethal in his third season on campus.
