Win, Place, Show: Awarding Coach of the Year honors for Power 5 conferences & the Group of 5

With bowl games beginning Friday, college football wrapped up its official #AWARDS SZN over the weekend by honoring USC quarterback Caleb Williams with the Heisman Trophy. 

TCU’s Sonny Dykes was named the 2022 national coach of the year, a well-deserved honor after he led the Horned Frogs to a magical 12-1 season and a spot in the College Football Playoff. 

The conferences all named their individual coach of the year last week, too, but what if some of my opinions differ a bit?

Well, here’s a rundown of my faux Coach of the Year ballots — win, place, show style — for each Power 5 conference and the best Group of 5 coaches in 2022. 

ACC – Coach of the Year

Win: Mike Elko, Duke

Place: Mike Norvell, Florida State

Show: Dabo Swinney, Clemson

I was very tempted to leave Swinney off entirely here due to his stubborn refusal to bench quarterback DJ Uiagalelei, which cost the Tigers a spot in the CFP, but still, Clemson did go 8-0 in the ACC and won the conference for the seventh time since 2015. 

Elko is the runaway winner here, though, as the first-year head coach delivered more conference wins (five) than the Blue Devils had the previous three seasons combined.

Duke finished the regular season 8-4 — its best showing since 2018. Three of its four losses were by a field goal or less (combined eight points), as the Blue Devils narrowly missed the program’s second 10-win season ever. 

The Seminoles went 9-3 in Norvell’s third season in Tallahassee. They survived a slew of injuries mid-year and rallied to win five straight, all double-digit wins, to end the season.

Big Ten – Coach of the Year

Win: Jim Harbaugh, Michigan

Place: Bret Bielema, Illinois 

Show: Jeff Brohm, Purdue

Talk about a slam-dunk decision in the Big Ten, Harbaugh had a legitimate case to be the national coach of the year. 

In the same calendar year he interviewed for the Minnesota Vikings’ head coach opening on National Signing Day — again, just bananas — the veteran UM coach led the Wolverines to their best regular season in 25 years despite replacing both coordinators, benching his starting quarterback and losing the No. 2 overall pick in the NFL Draft. 

Bielema and Brohm also deserve a little sugar after both Big Ten West coaches saw their teams outperform preseason expectations. 

The Fighting Illini weren’t even supposed to make a bowl in 2022, but in Bielema’s second season, they nearly won the Big Ten West and were ranked for the first time in years. They had one of the best defenses in the country and Bielema’s staff had multiple assistants under consideration for head coaching jobs. 

Brohm’s Boilermakers did win the west title, squeaking past Illinois thanks to a 31-24 win in Champagne in November. Before leaving for Louisville, Brohm gave Purdue a second-straight winning season for the first time in a quarter century. 

Big 12 – Coach of the Year

Win: Sonny Dykes, TCU 

Place: Lance Leipold, Kansas 

Show: Chris Klieman, Kansas State

In almost any other year, Lance Leipold would be a layup winner for his turnaround job at Kansas, but the Hypnotoad magic was too potent in 2022. 

What Dykes did in just a year at TCU is remarkable, taking largely the same roster from a checked-out 5-7 team to an undefeated regular season. While Lincoln Riley was the master at the portal rebuild, Dykes did it differently with even better success. 

He turned backup quarterback Max Duggan into a Heisman Trophy candidate and continuously dialed up the right calls seemingly every Saturday in pressure situations. 

Kansas finished the season on a three-game losing streak, but don’t let that overshadow Leipold’s resuscitation of a moribund Jayhawks’ program. They started the season 5-0, hosted ESPN’s College Gameday for the first time ever and are playing in a bowl game for the first time since 2008.

As for Klieman, all he did was turn K-State into one of the nation’s scariest squads by the end of the 2022 season. If the 12-team playoff were this season, the Wildcats would be among the toughest outs in the country after winning 5-of-6 down the stretch — four blowouts and  a nail-biting overtime upset over TCU in the Big 12 Championship. 

Pac-12 – Coach of the Year

Win: Lincoln Riley, USC

Place: Kyle Whittingham, Utah

Show: Kalen Deboer, Washington

Lincoln Riley’s rags-to-riches turnaround at USC is historic. The Trojans were a 4-8 team last season, and in 12 months, Riley had them on the doorstep of the CFP. 

By going on a transfer portal shopping spree, Riley stuffed USC’s roster with more talent and speed. He’s now selling MasterClass subscriptions on the side on how to engineer a rapid roster rebuild. 

USC had a lone regular season loss on the road at Utah by a single point and then fell to the Utes again in the Pac-12 Championship when the Trojans’ defense proved to be mostly a hollow horse. While Riley still needs to sort out that side of the ball, USC’s results in Year 1 prove exactly why the Trojans went to such lengths to hire Riley to change the direction of the program. 

Elsewhere in the Pac-12, as many as four or five other coaches could be listed on the ballot here. 

I road with Whittingham, who won the Pac-12 for the second-straight season despite all the shine going to Riley, UCLA and others in the league, and Deboer, who went 9-3 in his first year with the Huskies, but Oregon State’s Jonathan Smith or Oregon‘s Dan Lanning both deserve mention, too. 

Whittingham continues to be one of the most underrated — and overlooked — coaches in the country. Utah lost its best playmaker in Week 4, and Whittingham just went into a closet and found another 6-4 talented tight end and road Dalton Kincaid for the rest of the season. 

Washington won six straight to end the season, including narrow Top 25 thrillers over Oregon State and Oregon. Deboer turned Michael Penix into one of the best quarterbacks in the country.

SEC – Coach of the Year

Win: Josh Heupel, Tennessee

Place: Kirby Smart, Georgia

Show: Shane Beamer, South Carolina 

You could flip a coin here between Heupel and Smart, which is why both coaches won different conference COY awards last week. 

Under Heupel, Tennessee vastly exceeded expectations in his second season on Rocky Top, upsetting Alabama and getting ranked No. 1 nationally for the first time since 1998. 

With the nation’s top, high-flying offense, the Vols were the second-best team in the conference this year and won 10 regular season games for the first time 19 years. 

Smart’s work at Georgia was equally impressive after leading his alma mater to its first national championship season a year ago. The Bulldogs had to replace a record-15 NFL Draft picks and the loss of multiple assistant coaches yet it didn’t miss a beat this fall. They went 13-0 and won the SEC Championship, as Smart & Co. guided the nation’s best defense and entrusted quarterback Stetson Bennett to guide the ship offensively.

LSU’s Brian Kelly has a case for show after leading the Tigers to a 9-4 regular season, but South Carolina’s late-season turnaround gives Beamer, who went 8-4 this year, the nod on my ballot. 

The Gamecocks looked cooked after two ugly losses in three weeks to Missouri (23-10) and Florida (38-6), yet they ended November spoiling both Tennessee and Clemson’s playoff hopes with raucous performances to close the season. Beamer has carved out his own personality as a head coach, but he’s certainly living up to his daddy’s name, as the Gamecocks had the best special teams in the country this fall.

Group of 5 — Coach of the Year 

Win: Willie Fritz, Tulane

Place: Jon Sumrall, Troy

Show: Jeff Traylor, UTSA

The Green Wave were 2-10 a year ago, with five losses by a touchdown or less, so Fritz stayed the course and delivered the program the biggest single-season turnaround in FBS history with a win over UCF in the AAC Championship. Tulane hadn’t won a conference title since 1998 and is playing in its best bowl game in 82 years. 

Here’s a Did You Know? Aside from Georgia and Michigan, the two teams with longest active winning streak in the nation are Troy and UTSA at 10. 

Sumrall lost 2-of-3 to start his head coaching career with the Trojans, capped by a brutal walk-off Hail Mary loss at App. State, only to lead Troy to 10-straight wins and a Sun Bet Championship. The former Kentucky linebacker won’t be at Troy too long, as some Power 5 school will pluck Sumrall away soon. 

Likewise, Traylor continues to build up his resume to become a future Big 12 head coach — possibly at that school in Austin — with another C-USA Championship. The Roadrunners also lost 2-of-3 to open the year before running the table. Traylor is now 30-9 in three seasons at UTSA.