Out of Curiosity: Is Year Two Always a Step Forward?

Has nothing to do with this post, but it's the first thing that comes up when you search "out of curiosity," and I like it.
Last year about this time I was reading one of the preview magazines and it made a blanket statement to the effect of "Alabama will win more games this year since programs always show improvement in year two under a new head coach." I'll try avoid splitting hairs over what "show improvement" means under these conditions, since improvement doesn't always equal wins, and the idea that a team is going to be better just because it has had a year to better absorb a new coach's schemes and style ignores a lot of factors like player attrition/graduation, the difference in schedule between years, staff turnover, recruiting, and etc. But since this is just me amusing myself during the long dark that is the offseason, I decided to take a look at all of the current SEC coaches (save Mississippi State's Dan Mullen, who has never been a head coach, and UT's Lane Kiffin, who's only head coaching experience was with the Oakland Raiders and therefor doesn't count as head coaching experience) and see if their win totals improved from year one to year two at each of their coaching stops.
As you can see by the chart below, there's enough evidence (at least among the SEC head coaches) to support the assertion that teams will show improvement in year two of a new head coach:
A few thoughts:
- Houston Nutt, shockingly, is the only anamoly here, posting a one game improvement at Murray State, then overseeing a one game regression at Arkansas.
- Only Rich Brooks and Gene Chizik managed to consistently regress (though to be fair, Chizik only had the on chance, while Brooks managed it at both Oregon and UK).
- Saban and Bobby Johnson posted the biggest increases in win percentage in the league at 28% (at Alabama and Furman, respectively), while Saban and Mark Richt have posted the biggest increase in number of wins with five.
- Five of the ten coaches listed here managed nine or more wins in their first year on the job. Not sure what to make of this, honestly. You can argue that they are such good coaches that they were able to win immediately with someone else's players (who clearly weren't winning with them to begin with, otherwise "new head coach" wouldn't be there), or that they walked into a situation where success was inevitable and that anyone could have come in and won right away. Either way it's impressive, and honestly I'm a little surprised that only Nutt regressed. I would have imagined more of them would have pulled a Miles and stayed static until their recruits were truly in the system (year three mainly), but that's not the case.
- Even though there is generally improvement in year two, unless you are dealing with a proven head coach like Nick Saban or Urban Meyer or a program with the facilites and tradition to facilitate a big leap forward (like Georgia and Richt), for the most part a one or two game swing is the likeliest scenario for a new head coach heading into his second year.
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13 comments
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Is Year Two Always a Step Forward?
Generally, though sometimes I’ll walk backwards if the need arises.
Jokes aside, nice work.
Team Speed Kills
SBNation's SEC Blog
by Year2 on Jul 2, 2009 10:31 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs
Out of curiosity
I wonder what the front looks like?
There have certainly been exceptions to the rule, -Terry Bowden.
"A demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots." -H. L. Mencken
by Bens4vcobra on Jul 2, 2009 11:10 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs
In Bowden’s defense, he did go 11-0 his first season, so he really didn’t have much room to improve. But he did show a steady decline every season after. He was a good (not great) coach, but a horrible recruiter which I think more than anything contributed top his downfall.
by Jumpn_JackFlash on Jul 2, 2009 5:24 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Good Article
But man, why you gotta go in mess it up by not running spell check? All kidding aside, it’s a good article.
by BamaCLT on Jul 2, 2009 11:43 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs
spell check...
….is for hippies and pill poppers.
by Todd on Jul 2, 2009 12:00 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
lol...
"A demagogue is one who preaches doctrines he knows to be untrue to men he knows to be idiots." -H. L. Mencken
by Bens4vcobra on Jul 2, 2009 1:45 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
dont forget about the
perverts and malcontents…
welcome to the SEC kiffykins...
by tempebamafan on Jul 3, 2009 2:18 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Yeah...
…don’t forget about us.
by NiceLittleSaturday on Jul 5, 2009 8:46 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
Year 2 was a huge success in Minnesota
Tim Brewster
2007 – 1-11
2008 – 7-6
He didn’t have anywhere to go but up, but making a bowl game following a 1-11 season.
what you say here can, and will, be used against you
by GopherNation on Jul 2, 2009 12:40 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs
That is definitely an accomplishment...
…I should go around and do all of the current coaches one Sunday afternoon when I’m bored…
by Todd on Jul 2, 2009 12:49 PM CDT up reply actions 0 recs
My takeaway from this article....
Boy, Gene Chizik really sucks, doesn’t he?
"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog." - Bear Bryant
by NJBammer on Jul 3, 2009 7:28 AM CDT reply actions 0 recs
Good article.
I’ve always wondered why the majority of the new coaches at Bama (since Bryant) are down their first year compared to the guy they replaced. Perkins was even in wins with Bryant, but then Curry was down 2 to Perkins, Stallings was down 3 to Curry, Dubose was down 6 to Stallings, Franchione was actually plus 4 to Dubose (but Dubose had the worst Bama year since 1957 winning just 3 the year before), Shula was down 6 to Fran, and Saban was only plus 1 to Shula. That’s one guy even, 2 guys improved and 4 guys went down. The over all totals for first year coaches at Bama compared to the one they replaced (since Bryant) is a negative 12. In other words at Alabama when we get a new coach odds are we will start off on a down year.
But, this is what is strange, many other schools have had great 1st years with new coahces. Ole Miss is a great example.
I hate the NCAA more than UT & AU combined. At least with UT & AU you got a fighting chance.
by 5026 on Jul 3, 2009 4:27 PM CDT reply actions 0 recs

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