College Football Programs/Coaches in Make-or-Break 2021 Season

Rivalry games can make or break your program. Lots of programs focus their teams around that one game. Even a losing season can be deemed a success as long as you can beat your rival.

Jim Harbaugh has experienced this first hand at Michigan. All Jim does is win wherever he is. He won at Stanford, he won with the 49ers, and he has won a whole lot of games at Michigan (69 percent of them, to be exact).

Why has his name been appearing on the hot seat for a couple of years now? He hasn’t beat Ohio State. It’s rarely been close. That, partnered with Michigan's underwhelming 2020 COVID-19 campaign leaves the program at a crossroads. Have they reached their ceiling under Harbaugh? Only time will tell. Who else is entering a make-or-break 2021 season?

Michigan

It’s not Jim Harbaugh’s fault that the refs ruled JT Barrett gained enough yardage for the first down in overtime in that classic 2016 clash between the Wolverines and the Buckeyes. If the refs saw what the rest of America saw (in my opinion, he was clearly short), Harbaugh would’ve jolted the Michigan program into the Big Ten Title Game and be heavily favored to earn a spot in the CFP.

Instead, the Buckeyes got the first down and won the game. No CFP or Big Ten title for Harbaugh. Would the whispers of Harbaugh’s job security be so loud if he had those points on his resume? I don’t think so, but he didn’t win that game, so here we are.

2020 was a massive step back for Harbaugh and Co. The defense fell apart, there was no answer at QB, and there was a struggle for any kind of consistency. Ok, so you get a mulligan for a crazy, once-in-a-century season. I would imagine that won’t fly if Harbaugh struggles again in 2021.

Michigan awarded Harbaugh with a new contract right at the end of the season that runs through the 2025 season, but the language in it is pretty clear about how the school feels about the future of Harbaugh in Ann Arbor. His base salary shifts from a little over $8 million down to $4 million. His buyout (if hired elsewhere), is only $2 millions. If Michigan wants to fire him, they would only owe the coach $4 million, and the number goes down $1 million every year of the contract.

Harbaugh brought in another top-ten recruiting class in 2021, including five-star blue-chip QB JJ McCarthy, the No. 2 Pro-Style QB recruit in the country, and 12 four-star recruits. If Harbaugh struggles to find any consistency under center, he might turn to the talented freshman to save his job.

UCLA

Chip Kelly’s struggles at UCLA are one of the more baffling results from the post-2017 coaching hire. Kelly’s luster as a coach has dwindled more and more ever since he left Eugene for the NFL. It seemed like a slam-dunk hire to put Kelly in the heart of one of the best recruiting areas in the country, something he didn’t have as much access to at Oregon. Instead, Kelly has been a total flop.

You can look at his record (10-21 overall), his recruiting (19th in 2019, 40th in 2019, 32nd in 2020, and 30th in 2021), or the insane amount of money the athletic department spend on food and nutrition (which isn’t a bad thing, but it stands out) under Kelly (reported $5.4 million in 2019, the next closest in the Pac-12 was Arizona at $1.2 million). All of Kelly’s quirks as an HC just don’t seem to be translating to wins on the field.

It’s not just winning on the field too. UCLA itself has racked up a $40.7 million deficit over the last two fiscal years, not including the pandemic-affected 2020 football season. Over the two football seasons in that span, attendance and ticket revenue plummeted with the poor performance on the field.

Chip Kelly isn’t doing UCLA any favors on or off the football field. The Bruins haven’t even cracked .500 since Kelly took over, and there’s not much optimism that he will turn it around in year four due to the fact we have seen essentially zero progress despite crosstown USC in one of its worst stretches in program history.

Kelly’s buyout right now is ~$9 million, and I doubt UCLA would be willing to pay that given the last three years of finances. This 2021 season might decide if Kelly gets another chance as an HC anywhere.

Nebraska 

Scott Frost is another guy from the post-2017 coaching class that we are dying to see some progress from. Frost had an impeccable resume at UCF, and has yet to show any of that success at his alma mater.

In three seasons, Frost is just 12-20 and has yet to beat a ranked team. His offense has gotten worse every year (58th in 2018, 72nd in 2019, 101st in 2020), and his defense has ranked anywhere from 64th-88th. Not good. Bringing in talent hasn’t been a problem either. Frost has overseen four recruiting cycles in his time at Nebraska and ranked 23rd (2018), 17th (2019), and 20th (2020 & 2021).

Nobody is expecting Nebraska to return to the powerhouse it was in the late ’90s under Tom Osborne, but the two coaches prior to Frost, Mike Riley and Bo Pelini, easily won more games in their first three years (19 wins and 29 wins, respectively) then Frost has (12). Something has to give, and Frost has a lot to prove in 2021.

Writer

-By: TJ Mathewson