The top-five most down-bad college programs right now

I guess I’ll find out on Wednesday when Texas plays Arizona State whether or not I should have believed in karma but right now I’m agnostic on it. 

The coaching hot seat is an old concept that’s past its expiration date. Programs are not simply fixed by a new head coach. Programs require institutional cohesion and understanding of who to hire and who to fire. They also require coordination when it comes to NIL, realignment, etc. 

Inside Texas readers were the first to learn that Texas’ cohesion at the highest levels foreshadowed programatic success. While Texas isn’t alone in having good leadership, there are some schools, nay, traditional powers even, who have demonstrated extreme lack of forward planning. 

These schools are down bad and it will require state media to make you feel better about it.

1. Florida State

Jimmy Buffet could have left all his money to FSU and they’d still have financial issues. No that’d actually have helped, but Buffett was originally from Alabama anyway. The Florida thing was stolen valor like @bouree and @JYuma’s retirement. 

Norvell has always been good at coaching and really, really bad at building the relationships necessary to recruit at a high level. He would be a good match for a school that was NIL rich. That school is not FSU. Can either party afford to remain affiliated with the other?

Mike Norvell is down bad. We’re talking braided cornrows down bad. 

2. USC

Noted USC alum Will Ferrell should make a Christopher Guest-styled mockumentary about what happens when someone who struggles to establish toughness in Oklahoma moves to Southern California. Couldn’t make welders tough, will probably do well with party planners.

While his playbook might look like the constellations in the Griffith Observatory, Lincoln Riley’s ability to build a a real program was questioned well before he left OU. His success was just obscured by offensive dominance, especially at quarterback. Since his move to Southern Cal, Riley has only increased questions about his ability to author a complete program even when he had the No. 1 overall NFL Drat pick at quarterback.

Lincoln Riley is as down bad as somebody rich enough to be insulated by the realities of SoCal can be. 

3. Oklahoma

Lincoln Riley graces this list twice. Way for Muleshoe to represent! Littlefield, just 30 miles away, has Waylon Jennings. Talk about scoreboard.

I have a soft spot for Brent Venables. I don’t know if it’s because of my understanding he inherited an untenable situation in a brand new era or if I’d one day like to pick his brain about metabolism. One thing’s for sure, the inertia of the negative program feedback loop (losing better players than its gaining) is spiraling downward and it will take Chelsey Sullenberger to save it. Losing his defensive coordinator, Zac Alley, to the less-heralded Appalachian version of Oklahoma, certainly won’t improve his chances beyond this year. 

Brent Venables, seemingly good guy that he is and undoubtedly possessing abs, is down bad. 

4. Kentucky

Mark Stoops nearly leaving for A&M said a lot about each school. No offense to each school. Or Mark Stoops. Kentucky entered the 2024 season with high hopes of playing Stoops-ball into SEC relevance. It worked about as well as relationships in which the cheater returns home. Where ya been, Mark? You smell like the Brazos Valley. Maybe he lost trust, I don’t know, but he’s already lost a lot of talent to the portal.

Mark Stoops took metaphorical wildcatting too far and is down bad. 

5. Oklahoma State

Mike Gundy is one of the best coaches of this century. We’ve all seen him blossom into a grown man and varying shades of beige. “How is he more tan than coaches who spend equal amounts of time in the sun,” I often wonder. Over time he’s flourished like his mane with a full offseason to prosper. But man, this era was apparently much more suited to T. Boone Pickens than Gundy. As great of a coach as Gundy has been, it doesn’t appear he’s all that adaptable to the NIL era. From 10-4 in 2023 to 3-9 in 2024. How is it possible, that as the market and options for schematic fits expands through NIL, his success constricts? Alan Bowman, who is nearly a grown man of 40 himself, was the best Gundy could do at quarterback? Gundy made a career from press conferences and finding schematic fits. Now we’re left with press conferences. 

Mike Gundy is down so bad his tan is whiter than Ian Boyd’s playlist.