I have begun a deep dive into the 2023-24 bowl games and will be putting together all of the usual series of trends for the games that you’ve come to expect over the last seven years. The first part of this series deals with head coaching trends.
Here is a look at the best/worst performing head coaches for this year’s lineup in terms of bowl game performance. I’ve also shared some notable trends regarding totals.
As usual, the list of coaches whose teams perform better in bowl games is much longer than those who don’t, otherwise, they probably wouldn’t be coaching still. Here’s a quick bullet point list of the success stories, listed in last name order:
- Wyoming’s Craig Bohl has gone 3-2 in bowl games, including 4-0-1 ATS.
- Louisville’s Jeff Brohm was 5-1 SU and 4-2 ATS with Western Kentucky and Purdue.
- Troy Calhoun’s (Air Force) teams have gone 7-3 SU and 8-2 ATS in the last 10 bowl games.
- Kirk Ferentz (Iowa) has a record of 13-6-1 ATS overall in bowl games, including 4-0-1 ATS in the last five.
- Minnesota’s PJ Fleck is on a four-game outright bowl winning streak, with his teams going 3-1 ATS in those games.
- Hugh Freeze (Auburn) owns a 6-1 SU and ATS bowl game record while at his two prior schools.
- Butch Jones (Arkansas State) has seen his teams win four straight bowl games outright and ATS.
- Chuck Martin’s Miami (OH) teams are 1-3 SU but 4-0 ATS in bowl games.
- Greg Schiano (Rutgers) has a 5-2 SU and 5-1-1 ATS record in bowl games in two stints with Rutgers.
- Kirby Smart (Georgia) has an 8-2 SU and 7-3 ATS career bowl game mark.
Now, the underperformers:
- Toledo’s Jason Candle is on a five-game ATS bowl losing skid, but his team did get a first outright win last year over Liberty.
- Jim Harbaugh (Michigan) has six straight outright and ATS losses for the Wolverines.
- Clay Helton (Georgia Southern) is 1-4 SU and 0-5 ATS in bowl games with USC and GSU.
- Mike Norvell (Florida State) has yet to win a bowl game ATS (1-3 SU) in four previous tries.
- Rich Rodriguez (Jacksonville State) is on a 1-6 ATS skid as a bowl game head coach.
- Once formidable Kyle Whittingham (Utah) has lost four straight bowl games (1-3 ATS) after going 10-1 SU and 8-3 ATS prior.