2026 College Football: Jon Sumrall, Brent Venables Among Power Four Coaches Ranked 68-26

It's late May, which means two things around these parts. One is that the college football season is drawing near. Soon, we will be awash in conference media days and the sounds of pads popping in preseason camp.

The second is that it's time for the Ball Knowers among CBSSports.com's college football literati to rank the Power Four coaches. We've done this for over a decade, and, as has been the case each time, there is no set criterion for how any of our 10 voters rank the coaches.

You can rank strictly on achievements or potential. Hell, you can rank on who gives the best press conferences or who you think the best dresser is. Sure, the rest of us will probably give you the side eye if you do that and say things about you in the group chat (the one you aren't in), but we won't stop you from doing it.

The point is, there are no wrong answers here, at least, not among the group here. I'm sure plenty of you reading this will feel that most of the answers are wrong. That's OK too. We're used to it.

68. Tavita Pritchard, Stanford

Tavita Pritchard steps into one of the toughest P4 jobs in the country. He's the hand-picked selection of his old Stanford teammate, Andrew Luck. Typically, the voting process puts the new guys without experience at the bottom of their ballots. It's no surprise Pritchard starts at 68, and he was ranked last by seven of our 10 voters. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 67, Low: 68

67. Tosh Lupoi, California

We hop across the bay to Stanford's rival Cal and find our next coach, former Oregon defensive coordinator Tosh Lupoi. Lupoi is one of two Oregon coordinators to be plucked for P4 jobs this season, but he starts behind Kentucky's Will Stein in our rankings. I'm sure a friendly text will be sent about it. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 64, Low: 67

66. Collin Klein, Kansas State

The Prodigal Son returns home. Collin Klein is one of the best players in Kansas State football history, and now he's at the helm of the program after a successful stint as the offensive coordinator at Texas A&M . If he can do for Avery Johnson what he did for Marcel Reed and the Aggies last season, he's going to climb these rankings in a hurry. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 60, Low: 66

65. Morgan Scalley, Utah

Scalley is no longer the head coach-in-waiting. The Utah defensive coordinator has taken over as head coach in Salt Lake City, replacing Kyle Whittingham, who had been in charge since the 2004 season. Scalley inherits one of the Big 12's best programs and has extremely large shoes to fill. It's always tough being the guy who replaces The Guy. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 55, Low: 66

64. Will Stein, Kentucky

So does Stein finishing three spots ahead of Tosh Lupoi despite having the same CV mean our voters are biased toward the SEC, or offense over defense? Stein had a lot of success with quarterbacks while in charge of Oregon's offense, and now he's at a school that would really love to see any kind of success on offense because it hasn't been pretty lately. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 55, Low: 66

63. Bill Belichick, North Carolina

This is a fascinating result to me. Bill Belichick not only drops nine spots in our rankings after a 4-8 debut with the Tar Heels last season, but he's the only other coach besides Stanford's Tavita Pritchard to receive last-place votes. He got three! That's right, the coach who won six Super Bowls finished behind a coach who has never been a head coach at any level and was only 13 years old when Belichick won his first Super Bowl with the Patriots. I genuinely don't question my fellow voters' rankings too much, but I have a very difficult time seeing the logic behind those decisions. 2025 rank: 54 (-9), High: 52, Low: 68

62. Scott Frost, UCF

Scott Frost doesn't move an inch in this year's ranking. He was 62 last year, and he's 62 this year, dangit! Frost returned to UCF last season, the place where he made his name as a head coach, but didn't have a great season. The Knights finished 5-7 and only 2-7 in Big 12 play. However, Frost was only 6-7 in his first season at UCF in 2016 and then went 13-0 the next year, so if history repeats itself, I bet he's much higher than this next May. 2025 rank: 62 (0), High: 58, Low: 63

61. Bill O'Brien, Boston College

O'Brien didn't climb too high on anybody's ballot last season, but there was a level of respect for his 7-6 mark at Boston College . It's not an easy place to win football games, and that was a lot more evident in 2025 when the Eagles finished 2-10. Results like that tend to lead to drops in the rankings. 2025 rank: 50 (-11), High: 56, Low: 64

60. Deion Sanders, Colorado

Last year, Coach Prime was one of our biggest climbers, going from No. 61 to No. 33. He didn't finish lower than 43 on any of our ballots. This year, after a 3-9 season, he didn't finish higher than 52nd on any of our ballots. The 2024 season was special in Boulder, but it's sandwiched by two 1-8 seasons in conference play. 2025 rank: 33 (-27), High: 52, Low: 63

59. Jimmy Rogers, Iowa State

It didn't take long for Iowa State to identify Rogers as Matt Campbell's replacement. The former South Dakota State linebacker won an FCS national title at his alma mater in 2023 and went 6-6 at Washington State last year as the Cougars wandered the conference wilderness. If nothing else, the man clearly knows what it takes to win football games at schools that aren't easy to find on the map. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 44, Low: 63

58. Jeff Lebby, Mississippi State

Jeff Lebby finished last in our rankings last season in a fashion that amused me greatly. He didn't receive a single last-place vote, but since one of our voters had Stanford's Frank Reich 59th (how'd that work out?), it pushed Lebby to the bottom. Lebby made sure there wouldn't be any such chicanery this season, improving on his 2-10 debut in 2024 with a 5-8 record in 2025. He's still only 1-15 in SEC play, which makes it hard to justify putting him any higher than 50th on your ballot, but at least he's got some room between himself and the bottom now. 2025 rank: 68 (+10), High: 52, Low: 63

57. David Braun, Northwestern

Braun has kept the late-Fitzgerald Era tradition of yo-yo seasons alive and well at Northwestern . After an 8-5 debut in 2023, the Wildcats fell to 4-8 in 2024 before bouncing back with a respectable 7-6 last season. It's still one of the toughest places to win in the P4, but the team will move into a new stadium this year and hopes the additional revenue will help them compete better at a time when money matters more than ever. 2025 rank: 64 (+7), High: 42, Low: 62

56. Ryan Silverfield, Arkansas

Silverfield can be a tough coach to peg when putting together your board. You can't ignore that he went 50-25 at Memphis , including a 29-9 mark over the last three seasons, but at the same time, he never won a conference title with the Tigers, despite being at a financial advantage compared to other schools in the league. While Arkansas certainly has more money to spend than Memphis, Silverfield will no longer have that edge compared to spending across the SEC. It's proven to be a tough place to win games for a while now. 2025 rank: N/A, High: 39, Low: 61

55. Mike Locksley, Maryland

Mr. September has fallen on tough times at Maryland in recent years. After three straight winning seasons, the Terps have gone 8-16 the last two years, including 2-16 in Big Ten play. It's surprising to see Locks climb four spots because of it, but that's more about the number of coaches who were fired and replaced by new hires than it is Locks. The good news is that most of the young talent Maryland showcased last year is back. Whether or not Locksley takes advantage of that will probably be what determines if he's ranked here at all next season. 2025 rank: 59 (+4), High: 48, Low: 62

54. Rich Rodriguez, West Virginia

Perhaps we were all a little too excited about Rich Rodriguez's return to West Virginia last year. Forgive us, for our voting panel largely came of age when RichRod was lighting it up with the Mountaineers, and perhaps we got lost in nostalgia. The Eers went 4-8, Rodriguez's first losing season anywhere since 2016, and it hurt him amongst our voters. That said, most of us still hope for a rekindling of those Pat White, Steve Slaton, and Noel Devine teams of yore. 2025 rank: 42 (-12), High: 48, Low: 57

53. Scott Satterfield, Cincinnati

Every once in a while, we'll see a coach in our rankings that has one outlier vote or two that skews things a bit. Satterfield is an example this year. Eight of our voters had him pegged between 51st and 59th, but he also received 35th- and 40th-place votes, which put him up the board a bit compared to last year. The Bearcats went 7-6 last year, posting a winning conference record to reach a bowl game for the first time under Satterfield, so the climb is justified to some extent. 2025 rank: 60 (+7), High: 35, Low: 59

52. Greg Schiano, Rutgers

Schiano has received plenty of respect from our panel in the past, but it looks like we're all kind of moving on to shinier, newer things. The Knights went 5-7 last year and only 2-7 in Big Ten play. Schiano has been back at Rutgers for six years now and has yet to finish with a winning conference record as a Big Ten school. It's another place that isn't easy to win, but it's hard to justify putting him too high on your ballot without a "breakthrough" season to hang his hat on. 2025 rank: 43 (-9), High: 41, Low: 60

51. Pete Golding, Ole Miss

I couldn't wait to see how our voters would view Pete Golding, and the results did not disappoint. This is not an easy evaluation! On the one hand, Pete Golding has not only won a playoff game, but he has won two playoff games, including one against Georgia . There are plenty of coaches ranked well ahead of him who have never coached a playoff game, let alone two. There are also plenty who have never beaten Georgia in the regular season, let alone postseason. At the same time, Golding didn't build the team that did all that. He took it over after Lane Kiffin left in a very graceful and respectful way. So how much credit do you give him? As you can see from his high and low marks, opinions vary! 2025 rank: N/A, High: 38, Low: 65

50. Barry Odom, Purdue

Barry Odom's first season at Purdue went about as well as could be reasonably expected. The Boilermakers were only 2-10 overall and didn't win a Big Ten game, but the team looked far more competent on the field than it did in 2024. Odom finished as high as 39th on our ballots for what he did at Missouri and UNLV , but it will be interesting to see what happens if the Boilermakers don't make a more tangible improvement in 2026. 2025 rank: 51 (+1), High: 39, Low: 59

49. Fran Brown, Syracuse

If only winners get washed, Fran Brown was a lot dirtier in 2025 than in 2024. After going 10-3 in his debut season with the Orange, Syracuse backslid to 3-9 last year and 1-7 in the ACC. Quarterback injuries played a big role, but the truth is Syracuse was probably never quite as good as its 10-3 mark suggested in 2024, and not as bad as its 3-9 record last year. I'd expect them to land somewhere between both this year. 2025 rank: 46 (-3), High: 42, Low: 57

48. Luke Fickell, Wisconsin

Luke Fickell's stock is falling. There were extremely high hopes for Fickell in Madison when he was hired, but after going 5-7 in 2024, he fell from 17th to 40th in our rankings last year. Now, after another losing season (one in which the Badgers overhauled the roster), he drops another eight spots. Fickell has been hurt by injuries in his time with the Badgers, but with only one bowl appearance in three seasons and a new athletic director incoming, you can't help but wonder if 2026 is his last chance to prove it at Wisconsin . 2025 rank: 40 (-8), High: 44, Low: 61

47. Dave Aranda, Baylor

Ranking coaches in the middle of the Big 12 is tough because the league can be so volatile. After going 8-5

_Originally reported by [CBS Sports](https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/2026-college-football-coach-rankings-68-26-power-four/)._