ASU Football Coaching Search: Evaluating how well Kevin Sumlin, other candidates, match Ray Anderson’s coaching wish list

(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)

With Thanksgiving passed and college football’s regular season officially over, two of the holiday’s great traditions are underway.

The making of wish lists and the churning of the college football coaching carousel.

Arizona State athletic director Ray Anderson is getting to blend those two activities this winter as he searches for a new head coach for his football team days after firing Todd Graham.

Graham was let go at 8 a.m. on Sunday, but by noon, reports had already surfaced indicating ex-Texas A&M coach Kevin Sumlin is the leading man to take over in Tempe.

On Sunday afternoon, Anderson took to the podium to address Graham’s firing and lay out what he is looking for in potential candidates. Though the AD said no hiring was imminent, he gave the impression that he has been calculating this decision for a long time.

Now that Anderson has to make a decision on the most important coaching position in his athletic department, let’s take a look at how well Sumlin fits the bill and who else might be on ASU’s radar.

IS SUMLIN THE RIGHT FIT?

While explaining his reasoning for firing the third-winningest coach in school history, Anderson repeatedly used the word “average” when describing Graham’s tenure. From single-digit-wins records to mediocre-caliber-bowl berths, Anderson was underwhelmed by what Graham produced in more than a few ways, especially over the past three years.

Maybe the most crucial area of Graham’s underperformance was in recruiting.

“We have to get to the point where we are recruiting 4- and 5-star football players who want to come and play here,” Anderson said on Sunday. “…That’s where we need to make up ground because we don’t have that here now.”

Since 2012 (Graham’s first recruiting class at ASU), the average combined national recruiting class rank of all Pac-12 schools is No. 34 in the country, based off Rivals.com recruiting rankings. ASU’s six recruiting classes under Graham finished with an average national ranking of 32.5, about middle of the pack when compared to his conference counterparts.

Sumlin’s reign at Texas A&M was a different, and more impressive, story. During his six years in East Texas (he was also hired in 2012), the Aggies average national class ranking was 11.5 – almost eight spots higher than the average SEC class ranking of 19.

Even accounting for the difference of talent between West Coast recruits and Southeast prospects, Sumlin outperformed his conference peers far more than Graham did.

In Anderson’s judgement, ASU was average in the recruiting world. Sumlin’s Texas A&M program was not.

The attraction of better talent also helped Sumlin send more of his players to pros. While at A&M, seven of his players were selected in the first round of the NFL Draft and 18 were drafted overall. ASU had just one and 10 respectively during that time frame.

Another shortcoming not overlooked by Anderson. Another box Sumlin seems to check.

“You cannot have a year where none of our [non-specialists] players get drafted into the NFL and only one player, a kicker, is [in] the combine,” Anderson said, referencing how Zane Gonzalez was the only ASU player to have his name called in last April’s draft; there was a Texas A&M player taken in each of the first five rounds.

But, Sumlin’s resume doesn’t meet all of Anderson’s stated requirements.

Coaching turnover has been an issue for Sumlin while at A&M. In his six seasons, he has had three different offensive coordinators and two different defensive coordinators. It’s an unstable precedent Anderson wants to avoid.

“At the end of the day the head coach is responsible for developing and then retaining his coaches so you can have continuity,” Anderson said.

Sumlin also didn’t win that many games in the SEC, hence his firing from Texas A&M. While success is never easy when sharing a division with the likes of Nick Saban and Les Miles, Sumlin eclipsed the 10-win mark just once in College Station (his debut season in 2012). His victory total actually suffered a steady decline during his tenure, dropping to 9 in 2013, then 8 in each year between 2014-16 before winning a tenure-low 7 games this past campaign.

He never qualified for a BCS or New Year’s Six bowl either.

Anderson will want far tangible success if he indeed makes a move for Sumlin.

“We have been average. 7-5 and second place in a riddled Pac-12 South is not our aspiration,” Anderson said. “We deserve more. We have the capacity and the university and the community that deserves more and I very frankly should demand more.”

When it comes to a relatively thin coaching market though, Sumlin might be in the best position to appease those lofty demands.

WHO ELSE COULD BE A MATCH?

In the days since Graham’s firing, more than a dozen names have been linked with ASU’s coaching vacancy.

Everyone from Les Miles to Mack Brown have been speculated as possible hires for Anderson to make. But, there are only a handful of names that would satisfy the wishes Anderson laid out on Sunday.

BRYAN HARSIN (Head Coach, Boise State): As Chris Petersen’s successor at Group-of-5 power Boise State, Harsin has continued the Broncos dominance in the Mountain West Conference. In his debut campaign in 2014, Harsin guided BSU to a conference championship and Fiesta Bowl title; he has won no less than 9 games in Boise since. Harsin has also been a solid recruiter, securing the MWC’s top-ranked class three times, and also helped Texas sign back-to-back top-3 classes in the country while serving as the Longhorns offensive coordinator between 2011-12. Coaching turnover has been an unsettling theme during Harsin’s BSU tenure. Not one of his coordinator has stuck around for more than 2 years, though all of the top assistants that left his program did so to take jobs with Power-5 schools.

DEREK MASON (Head Coach, Vanderbilt): A Phoenix native, Mason graduated from Camelback High School before playing as a defensive back for Northern Arizona University. His ties on the West Coast are also deep in the coaching world, where Mason has held assistant coaching jobs at Weber State, Idaho State, Utah, New Mexico State and most notably Stanford. Since being hired at Vanderbilt in 2014 though, Mason has struggled to win games in the loaded SEC. Just once has he led the Commodores to bowl eligibility. This past season, Vandy suffered a 1-7 mark in conference play this season. Recruiting has been another difficulty for Mason in the competitive region, his school finishing with the lowest ranked class in the conference in each year of his tenure.

JIM MORA (Former Head Coach, UCLA): Though likely not a popular name to ASU fans, Mora checks a lot of the boxes Anderson is looking for. The recently-fired ex-Bruins coach has been a head man in both college and the NFL, and was just one win away from coaching in a Super Bowl back in 2004. During his six years at UCLA, Mora’s career arc followed Graham’s: a strong first three seasons highlighted by back-to-back 10-win years in 2013-14, but then a steady decline over the second half of his tenure that included missing a bowl game in 2016. Where Mora differs from Graham is in recruiting. While Graham’s average class rank (as detailed above) was 32.5, Mora checked in with an average rank of No. 14 in the country and never finished lower than fourth in the conference. He also might be one of the few candidates willing to keep ASU’s current coordinators, especially given that his offensive coach, Jedd Fisch, has been rumored to be looking for a head coaching job of his own.

PEP HAMILTON (Offensive Coordinator, Michigan) & TERYL AUSTIN (Defensive Coordinator, Detroit Lions): Though both seasoned coaches with NFL experience, neither Hamilton nor Austin have been a head coach before, something Anderson claimed he “absolutely” wanted in a potential candidate. A rookie coach would have a tall task in trying to meet Anderson’s sky-high expectations for both recruiting and winning games.