Coaching – Net Game Effect.   When you have 75-80% of all AQ games predicted correctly 6 months in advance of the season, there are a lot of little reasons that weigh on the outcome of individual games, but overall, the only true impact outside of talent and stadium is coaching.  I refer to the head coach for the Coaching Effect as he is getting paid the big bucks and hired most or all of his staff.  But Coaching Effect is really the entire staff from recruiting strategy, evaluations, player development, game coaching and much more.

When a team fails to beat another team, whether at home or on the road this is a +1 (for an upset) or -1 game (for being upset) against the coaching staff.  Most coaches fall within close range of predicted expectations.  35 of the current 55 AQ teams with experienced head coaches are within +/- 1.5 games of their predicted annual win totals. It is the teams on the extreme ends of the curve where you will find the tough home teams, the road warriors, the Coaches doing more with less and the hottest seats in college football.

These rankings are not about the ‘best overall coaches’, but rather how well they do relative to their recruited talent.  You need to keep in mind, that elite teams have very few opportunities to earn +1 games and are always on an ‘upset alert’.  The flip side is true of very poorly talented teams like Duke, Iowa State, et al, in that nearly every conference game is a chance for an upset.  A zero effect for these low ranked recruiting teams is an indicator of a stagnating program.

An example on the elite side is the Oklahoma Sooners.  The Sooner fan argument is always “Why isn’t Stoops higher on the coaching effect list?  They haven’t lost at home for nearly 6 years.”.  They have not played a single team during that streak that out recruited them over the previous 4 years to overcome the national home field advantage average.  The CFBMatrix model expected them to win all those games.  That is why they are a near zero effect at home.  It is actually very good for an elite to be at or near zero effect.

Please check out all the rankings and rating for each team and keep in mind the previous review.  In addition to the total ranks, I have broken it down by the toughest/worst at home and on the road as well as teams that performance above average on the road vs home.   New coaches, that have no metrics, are not included.