As Florida is in the midst of looking for a new coach, names like Lane Kiffin, Eli Drinkwitz, and Jeff Brohm are among the most common being brought up as candidates for the Gators.
There are other names too, and there are pathways for several guys to succeed, but when one looks at Florida's recent history, there is one trait that all the successful coaches have shared.
Florida's new coach must have Power 4 experience
The one non-negotiable that any new coach at Florida has to have for football is previous head coaching experience at the Power 4 level.
Obviously, guys like Kirby Smart, Dan Lanning, and Marcus Freeman didn't have that on their resume before taking over their current program, but for whatever reason, Florida has had zero success trying to pluck guys without that experience.
Consider the list of guys Florida has hired since the Steve Spurrier Era:
Head Coach | Previous Stop |
|---|---|
Steve Spurrier | Head coach at Duke |
Ron Zook | DC for New Orleans Saints |
Urban Meyer | Head coach at Utah |
Will Muschamp | DC for Texas |
Jim McElwain | Head coach at Colorado State |
Dan Mullen | Head coach at Mississippi State |
Billy Napier | Head coach at Louisiana |
Zook, Muschamp, McElwain, and Napier were undeniable flops and all came to Florida without previous Power 4 head coaching experience.
Spurrier had that experience and led Duke to an ACC title.
Utah wasn't considered a Power 4 program when Meyer was there, but he also led Utah to a Fiesta Bowl victory before arriving in Gainesville.
Mullen, for better or for worse, has the third-best winning percentage of any Gator coach to be with the program for at least 40 games, and he, too, had previous Power 4 experience.
There is a reason why when one looks at coaching hot boards for the Gators, it's filled with almost exclusively current Power 4 coaches. Guys like Alex Goelsh (USF) and Jon Sumrall (Tulane) might wind up being decent Power 4 coaches down the line, but Florida is not in a position to hire a guy who needs to learn on the job.
Likewise, that same logic applies to coordinators like Will Stein (Oregon), Brian Hartline (Ohio State), or D'Anton Lynn (USC).
Hopefully, Scott Stricklin convinces Lane Kiffin to be Plan A, and the search is done. But if Kiffin falls through, Stricklin needs to learn from the past when thinking about Plan B.