The annual Athlon Sports ranking is out now for Big Ten football coach rankings. Not bad for the most part in my opinion, but I think there are a few oddities that should have been avoided. Here are the rankings:
My main issues with the ranking is I think Rhule should be placed behind Fleck and especially Bielema until he has a few good Big Ten wins under his belt. Fickell did enough at Cincinnati to justify leaping coaches like Ferentz out of the gate, but, while I think Rhule was a great hire, Bielema still has multiple Big Ten titles from his Wiscy days and did a great job with ILL thus far. I also think Locksley should be ahead of Schiano.
Finally, one other small thing, but the author refers to the DMV in a redundant way that is a tad suggestive he isn't actually familiar with the acronym. In the write-up about Locksley, he states: "(Washington, D.C. and DMV area)" and it is redundant as a result because the "D" in the "DMV" stands for "District of Columbia."
- Jim Harbaugh
- Ryan Day
- James Franklin
- Luke Fickell
- Kirk Ferentz
- Matt Rhule
- P.J. Fleck
- Bret Bielema
- Mel Tucker
- Greg Schiano
- Mike Locksley
- Tom Allen
- Ryan Walters
- David Braun
My main issues with the ranking is I think Rhule should be placed behind Fleck and especially Bielema until he has a few good Big Ten wins under his belt. Fickell did enough at Cincinnati to justify leaping coaches like Ferentz out of the gate, but, while I think Rhule was a great hire, Bielema still has multiple Big Ten titles from his Wiscy days and did a great job with ILL thus far. I also think Locksley should be ahead of Schiano.
Finally, one other small thing, but the author refers to the DMV in a redundant way that is a tad suggestive he isn't actually familiar with the acronym. In the write-up about Locksley, he states: "(Washington, D.C. and DMV area)" and it is redundant as a result because the "D" in the "DMV" stands for "District of Columbia."