Third Year Coaches for 2007

Professional handicapper Phil Steele has often extolled the value of having a coach in his third year with a team as a positive. Among the rationale offered is that players have had a couple of seasons to play within the new coach’s system and the coach has more of his own recruits on the team. While there is certainly a multitude of factors that account for the success or not-so-success of a team during any given season, just for fun, we crunched a few numbers for coaches who were in their third year with the same team for the 2006 season. There were eleven Division I-A coaches who fit the criteria. On average, those coaches had 8 returning offensive starters (more often than not having a returning starting QB) and 8 returning defensive starters. Of the eleven teams from 2006, five had at least one more straight-up win than the previous season, six clubs improved their ATS records by at least one more win.

Here are the 22 coaches starting this season in their third year with their respective clubs, last season’s SU and spread records and returning offensive-defensive starters (* indicates a returning QB) then and now:

‘07 3rd Year Coach ‘06 SU/ATS record (‘06 returning starters) ‘07 returning starters

Les Miles, LSU 11-2/6-7 (6*-5) (6-8)

Ed Orgeron, Ol Miss 4-8/5-4-2 (5-5) 9*-6

Urban Meyer, Florida 13-1/5-7-1 (6*-6) 6-2

Steve Spurrier, SC 8-5/9-3 (7*-5) 7*-10

Ron Zook, Illinois 2-10/5-6 (9*-10) 8*-9

Mike Gundy, OKSU 7-6/7-4-1 (9*-5) 8*-7

Ty Willingham, Wash 5-7/6-5-1 (6*-8) 6-6

Walt Harris, Stanford 1-11/3-9 (10*-6) 8-8

Dave Wannstedt, Pitt 6-6/5-6 (6*-6) 8-6

Greg Robinson, Syracuse 4-8/8-4 (6*-4) 7-5

Kyle Whittingham, Utah 8-5/7-4-1 (6*-7) 10*-6

Bronco Mendenhall, BYU 11-2/10-2-1 (8*-4) 6-7

Mike Sanford, UNLV 2-10/4-6-1 (7*-5) 8*-6

Mark Snyder, Marshall 5-7/4-7 (9*-6) 7*-7

Skip Holtz, ECU 7-6/10-3 (7*-6) 6-8

Brent Guy, Utah State 1-11/3-9 (7*-6) 8*-11

Hal Mumme, NMSU 4-8/7-3 (6-6) 10*-7

Dick Tomey, San Jose State 9-4/9-3 (7*-2) 7*-8

Charlie Weis, ND 10-3/4-8-1 (7*-9) 4-5

Bill Cubit, W. Michigan 8-5/8-5 (6*-8) 8-8

Frank Solich, Ohio U. 9-5/7-6 (9*-9) 5-6

Shane Montgomery, MI-OH 2-10/4-8 (5-2) 8*-6

Periodically, we’ll keep our readership notified of the progress (or regression) made (if any) of these squads. Stay tuned....