If there was any doubting Brian Kelly’s abilities as a football coach and program builder, he all but put that to rest with a lightning-fast turnaround in Baton Rouge.
Kelly inherited a team that had gone 11-11 in the final two seasons under Ed Orgeron, but he turned that into a 10-4 campaign in 2023 in which he won the SEC West by engineering an upset over Alabama.
He’s the third-winningest active head coach in college football behind only Nick Saban and Mack Brown, and he’s the winningest coach in history for a storied Notre Dame program.
Given what he’s already accomplished and did last year at LSU, it’s not surprising to see Pro Football Focus rank him among the nation’s top coaches at No. 6 nationally.
Here’s what PFF’s Max Chadwick wrote about him.
Like Riley, Kelly took over an LSU program that went below .500 in 2021. In his first year there, the Tigers won 10 games and the SEC West title.
Before that, Kelly posted five top-10 finishes since 2009 while at Cincinnati and Notre Dame. He brought the Fighting Irish to three College Football Playoffs and a BCS National Championship game. He’s a proven winner and should have LSU competing for another SEC West championship this season.
Of the five coaches that rank ahead of Kelly, three of them — Saban, Kirby Smart and Dabo Swinney — have won multiple national championships. Jim Harbaugh and Lincoln Riley are still searching for their first like Kelly, but they rank above him here.
It’s hard to argue too much with this, especially given Kelly’s placement ahead of coaches like Ryan Day and Kyle Whittingham. If LSU can take the next step this year and compete for a College Football Playoff spot, you may see Kelly’s name even higher on lists like this after 2023.
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