Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Best College Fottball Coaches

With all the debates raging right now and the firings starting I thought we could debate who is the best or personal favorite.

The list is long with names such as Amos Alonzo Stagg, Walter Camp, "Pop" Warner clear up to today with Joe pa, Bo, Jim Tressel.

What would Rockne have done had he coached longer? Walter Camp had the best winning percentage and Stagg made Chicago a powerhouse. Gil Dobbie was impressive but disliked.

It's an unwinnnable but fun topic. Yost at Michigan, the Bear at Bama.

So anyone have a favorite or opionion on who's the best.

Paterno HAS to be on the list. I'm thinking the one's you named are a damned good place to start, except Tressel (hasn't earned THAT recognition... yet... though he may).

I loved John McKay at USC, probably one of the most quotable coaches ever.

Bill Snyder from Kansas State has to be considered one of, if not the best coach ever in college football. He took the worst team in college football and turned them into a national contender. He left, the team crashed, he came back and now their on the way back up. Great talent makes any coach look like a genius. I like the guys who get it done with mediocre talent, and a place that's tough to recruit. Bill Snyder's the man.

I think that the 9 yrs that Pete Caroll spent at UCS was a good a stretch as I have ever seen, won over 80% of his games but was hated by most everone who wasent a USC fan (myself included). But I think my favorite has to be Lou Holtz, he always has something crazy to say.

Bear Bryant

Bill Snyder, Lou Holtz and of course........Paul Bear Bryant.......

Hated,....but have to include Saben. 2 National Championships at 2 different schools.

The Bear.

Recently read a book about Pop Warner and Jim Thorpe at the Carlisle Indian School. Warner was a pretty amazing innovator over the years. I'd give him a lot of credit for what he added to the game rather than someone who excelled at recruiting and organizational skills, and adapting someone else's ideas to work for them.

Depends on what you mean by best. There are great game day coaches who know how to call a game and put their teams in position to win. There are great X's and O's coaches who design schemes and plays. And there are also great program builders, guys who come into a situation and construct a winning program out of nothing much or change an existing program's philosophy to take it to another level.

Sometimes these coaching types are present in one man and sometimes they aren't.

I like Lou Holtz as a tye 1. Another good one was Tom Osborne. One was very adaptive to the play of the other team and the other stuck to his guns and ran his own offense with a calm demeanor regardless of game situations. Both won games they weren't expected to and should not have won.

Type 2 greats that come to mind are Bowden, Spurrier and even Rodriguez. All took existing offensive systems and put them on their ears. Rodriguez' Spread Option has taken the sport by storm. A cross between good old fashioned smash mouth and school yard tag, this offense is going to be used by both teams in this year's championship game.

Type 3? To my mind Barry Alvarez is unparalleled. He came into a dismal situation in a program that had floundered for decades. He not only built a quick history of hard nosed successful football but he did it by finding and developing a type of player that had become an anachronism in the sport. He built a very good program with players and an offensive philosophy that the game had abandoned as old fashioned. Nice man to boot.

Will

Penguin, great coaches there for sure. However, Snyder took THE worst program in college football and made them a power. Holtz, Osborne, Switzer, Bowden, etc all had exceptional talent to work with.

When Bowden came to Florida St. in 76 there was nothing to work with. He built it into a power.

Jimmy Johnson brought the Canes back after the first year and did win a national title during his reign... JG your picks are a +1..great bunch of coaches.. Might have to put Bob Devaney and Mack Brown in there too..

I agree that it depends on what you mean by "best."

If you hate Notre Dame, your all-time #1 best might be Charlie Weis ...

Paterno is the obvious choice. Graduation rate and impact on the pros (linebackers and running backs are most obviuos but there are so many more). I hope he goes out on top and not when his time has past.

I would say that Paterno is the best of all time.

I also like what Jerry Moore has done at Appalachian State. Check out his record, it has been amazing!

Houston Nutt!! Hardy har har.

Just putting out more names. Wallace Wade, Bobby Dodds, Shug Jordon, Johnny Heisman, Vince Dooley.

There's all kinds of best. Most titles, most wins or winning percentage, longevity and continuious suscess as Joe pa.

There's different styles and philosophys also. There is no way to say who is best all time. It's more who do you remember or who you really liked.

P.S. Jock Sutherland

I love Joe Pa as he coached the first football game I ever saw. But now I really have to say I am impressed with Chris Peterson (Boise State) and Gary Patterson (TCU). There is just something about building a team from pretty much nothing that means a lot to me. Granted the Boise State team that Peterson inherited from Hawkins was pretty good, but he has taken them to a completely higher standard.

I think it is much harder to be a great coach today because schools like Notre Dame can't just come in and say we are the only school that has a ton of games on TV. Also the name Notre Dame just isn't as big as it wants was, no school swings a stick like that any more. I think about how much FSU and Miami has fallen off. Sure the coaching has not been up to the traditional standard. But also alot of the depth they had now goes to FIU, UCF and USF. Much tougher game these days, IMHO.