Stanford Steve considers how many games Baylor can win in 2024

There seem to be two pertinent questions when it comes to Baylor’s 2024 football season. How many games can the Bears win? And how many wins are enough to keep Dave Aranda as the head coach for 2025?

Aranda enters the 2024 season pretty squarely on the hot seat after some middling seasons, but ESPN’s “Stanford Steve” Coughlin seems bullish on the upside for Baylor in 2024. And as he told On3’s Andy Staples, he’s not going to be picking against Aranda often.

“That’s the great thing we have in this sport, because you don’t know what’s going on in that locker room and the belief, or the not belief that we’ve seen with some teams, that happens throughout the course of a season,” Coughlin said. “But I still think the world of Aranda and I do expect a bowl season from Baylor.”

And speaking to the locker room dynamic, Coughlin has no doubts about Aranda’s Xs and Os acumen or his ability to identify talented players. He just sensed something was off kilter in 2023.

If whatever was amiss is back in place, which Coughlin seems to expect it might be, then he has high hopes for Baylor to make a bowl game.

“I love the hire of Jake Spavital, I think he’s a great offensive mind,” Coughlin said. “I wonder about the quarterback depth after the starter, knowing what Jake wants to do and what he puts on a quarterback’s plate. But there’s no doubt in my mine Dave Aranda can coach his butt off. I just think the way people plucked his roster, it was unfortunate with the offensive coordinator, I thought Grimes was good. But there was a — it felt like there was just a disconnect. You saw how smart he was with that quick turnaround when they had that great season. So I don’t question Aranda at all as the head coach. I think he’s tremendous, I think he’s a super great football mind.”

So if both Staples and Coughlin think Baylor can hit the six win mark and make a bowl, the next question becomes: Is just six wins enough for Aranda to hold on to his job? Or does he need to hit the seven or eight win mark?

In that regard, Coughlin suspects going better than 6-6 will serve Aranda well. And that means not only holding serve at home — a key task for an embattled coach — but also pick off a few big-time road wins.

“And Baylor, middle of the pack, not a lot of expectations, but then you count in the pressure of a head coach possibly coaching for his job, that’s a lot that could instill in a locker room that kind of makes you almost want to go on the road and be able to prove yourself,” Coughlin said. “‘Oh alright, so what, we won a game. Still no one believes in us because we won a home game. Alright, let’s go on the road and prove it, that our staff’s good enough and our players are good enough.'”