Oklahoma football: Where do OU coaches rank among the GOATs?
By Chip Rouse
You would think that a ranking of the top 100 college football coaches in the last 50 years would hold the two legendary Oklahoma football coaches during that period in high regard.
If you’re an Oklahoma fan maybe. But not apparently if you are ESPN staff writer Bill Connelly.
Unless you subscribe to ESPN+, you would not have seen this ranking, so I’ll highlight it for you.
Nick Saban, who in 14 seasons at Alabama has been unworldly, winning six national championships and playing for two others, ranks No. 1, followed by Paul “Bear” Bryant. Given the career resumes of those two coaching icons, it’s hard to quibble with their one-two ranking.
Bobby Bowden, who spent 34 season at the helm of Florida State, and Tom Osborne of Nebraska rank three and four. Urban Meyer, whose head-coaching career didn’t begin until 2000, is No. 5. But is he the fifth best over the past 50 years? I would question that.
The second group of five includes former Sooner head coach Barry Switzer. Switzer is No. 9 in Connelly’s ranking, preceded by No. 6 John McKay of USC, Dabo Swinney of Clemson, and Bill Snyder of Kansas State.
Switzer didn’t invent the wishbone offense, but he sure as heck was the offensive mastermind who turned it into one of the greatest offensive designs of all time. The legendary Sooner coach won 147 games in 16 seasons, three national championships and 12 conference titles. In over half of his 16 seasons, Oklahoma finished in the top three in the Associated Press rankings.
He deserves to be ranked higher and ahead of Bill Snyder and John McKay.
If you are wondering about Bob Stoops, which I certainly was, he finally shows up at No. 26. It’s hard to argue with many of the names ahead of him — coaching legends like Joe Paterno of Penn State, Eddie Robinson of Grambling, Woody Hayes of Ohio State, Darrell Royal of Texas and Lou Holtz of Notre Dame and several other schools — but here’s the rub when it comes to where Stoops falls in the ranking.
Mack Brown of Texas, Clemson and North Carolina fame ranks No. 21, five spots higher that Oklahoma’s winningest head coach, and so does Don James of Washington, at No, 22.
Brown may have had a longer coaching career than Stoops, but the former OU head coach was exceedingly more successful. Stoops had a winning percentage of .798 (190-47) in 18 seasons. Brown has lost 132 games (85 more than Stoops) and has a career winning percentage of .661.
Stoops and Brown met head-to-head 15 times in the annual OU-Texas Red River rivalry, Stoops was 9-6 in those games, and several of the nine were blowouts. There is no way that Brown’s resume as a head coach is better than what Stoops did at Oklahoma.
As for Don James, Stoops won more games (+15), lost fewer (-32) and won more conference championships 10 to 6). The defense rests.
When you glance through the coaching names in the 1 through 50 ranking it reads like a virtual who’s who of college football coaches, as it should. And that impression is even more startling when you look at the names in the 51-101 grouping. I mean, we’re talking of names like Terry Donohue of UCLA (No. 55), R.C. Slocum of Texas A&M (No. 56), Hayden Fry of Iowa (No. 61), and Charlie McLendon of LSU (No. 94).
In the spot immediately in front of McLendon is Kirby Smart of Georgia. I point out the current Georgia head coach because he made the top-100 list but Lincoln Riley did not. Smart has 52 wins to Riley’s 45, but he also has coached one more season. Riley’s winning percentage (45-8, .849) is higher than Smart (52-14, .787), and Riley’s
Moreover, Oklahoma teams have made three College Football Playoff appearances to Georgia’s one. Granted, Georgia beat OU in the 2017 national semifinals, but that game, one of the best first-round playoff games ever, could have gone either way.
Everybody is entitled to their own opinion, which is why I respect and appreciate the difficult challenge that Connelly took on for ESPN. Trying to differentiate between all of these great head coaches and come up with a somewhat subjective ranked order is never going to be to everyone’s liking.
Count me as one of the contrarians. I believe the top three Sooner head coaches of the past 50 years are undervalued in Connelly’s ranking. And ALL three deserve to be in the top 100.