Nick Saban retired as dean of the SEC after 17 seasons and six national championships at Alabama.
Georgia’s Kirby Smart, one of Saban’s brightest students, is now the most accomplished coach in the conference, but Smart isn’t the longest-tenured SEC head coach.
That title belongs to Kentucky’s Mark Stoops, set to begin his 12th season in Lexington.
Smart, entering Year 9 at Georgia, is second to Stoops in SEC tenure.
Third? Lane Kiffin at Ole Miss. And he was hired not so long ago, on Dec. 7, 2019. The next day, Arkansas hired Sam Pittman and Missouri hired Eli Drinkwitz.
The SEC is the strongest conference in college football, but it’s short on proven SEC coaches. There’s a Saban-sized hole from which a collection of candidates could try to emerge.
Here are The Oklahoman’s rankings of SEC coaches from 16 to 1:
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16. Jeff Lebby, Mississippi State
Lebby, by default, finds himself at the bottom of this list.
The former Sooner offensive coordinator has zero head coaching experience, but hey, you have to start somewhere. And few get an SEC job from the jump. Mississippi State is an awfully hard place to win, but Lebby should be given time to prove himself.
15. Clark Lea, Vanderbilt
Lea could be Knute Rockne reincarnate, but we’d never know. Not even Rockne could coach up the Commodores in this hyper-competitive, arms race era of college football.
Vanderbilt doesn’t stand a chance in this SEC, and that has nothing to do with Lea.
Unfair as it might seem, it’s difficult to justify Lea being higher on this list.
14. Sam Pittman, Arkansas
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FBS head coaching record: 23-25
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Record at Arkansas: 23-25 (11-23, SEC)
Arkansas went 9-4 (4-4 SEC) in Pittman’s second season. But 7-6 and 4-8 seasons to follow have Pittman on the hot seat. The Razorbacks went 1-7 in the SEC last season.
Pittman, who grew up in Grove, was a lifelong assistant until at age 58 Arkansas hired him as a head coach.
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13. Brent Venables, Oklahoma
It’s too soon to draw conclusions about Venables the head coach.
Year 1 was a mess. The Sooners went 6-7, finishing with a losing record for the first time since 1998. Venables righted the Schooner last year, but that was against a relatively weak Big 12 schedule. Now OU is faced with the toughest conference schedule in the SEC.
Venables has revamped the OU defense, but questions abound on the offensive side. It’s a big year for the Sooners, and a critical one for Venables.
12. Shane Beamer
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FBS head coaching record: 20-18
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Record at South Carolina: 20-18 (10-14, SEC)
South Carolina is the second-worst program in the SEC by our rankings. A member of the SEC since 1992, the Gamecocks have a .424 winning percentage in the conference.
At 10-14, Beamer is slightly worse (.416) than that. Still a solid job, though, by the former Sooners assistant.
11. Billy Napier, Florida
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FBS head coaching record: 51-26
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Record at Florida: 11-14 (6-10, SEC)
The results at Florida have been bad for Napier. Back-to-back 3-5 SEC finishes won’t cut it.
Napier’s seat is warm, and it’s bad timing, because the Gators are up against a brutal schedule.
But unlike the five aforementioned coaches on this list, Napier has proven himself at another school. Napier went 40-12 in his four seasons at Louisiana. He led the Cajuns to four bowl games, three of which they won.
In 2020 and 2021, Louisiana was ranked in the final College Football Playoff poll.
More: Is OU football a playoff contender or pretender? Examining cases for SEC’s ranked teams
10. Eli Drinkwitz, Missouri
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FBS head coaching record: 40-22
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Record at Missouri: 28-21 (17-17, SEC)
Drinkwitz, who not so long ago was on the hot seat, has one of the highest approval ratings among SEC coaches.
That’s what an 11-2 season will do for you. And Missouri could rip off another 10-win season in 2024 given the Tigers’ manageable schedule.
Drinkwitz will rocket up this list if he proves last year was no fluke.
9. Mike Elko, Texas A&M
The New Jersey native might seem an odd fit in College Station, but Elko spent four seasons (2018-21) at Texas A&M as defensive coordinator. Now he’s back as the top boss after two seasons as Duke’s head coach.
Under Elko, the Blue Devils went 9-7 in the ACC. It was Duke’s best two-season stretch since 2014-15.
He’ll have a few more resources at his disposal at Texas A&M.
8. Hugh Freeze, Auburn
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FBS head coaching record: 89-50
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Record at Auburn: 6-7 (3-5, SEC)
Freeze can coach, but with him comes loads of unseemly baggage.
He had a .609 winning percentage in five seasons at Ole Miss, but he resigned in 2017 amid a flurry of controversies. The NCAA dinged Ole Miss for a “lack of institutional control.”
Freeze landed softly at Liberty, where he guided the Flames to four bowl games in each of his four seasons.
Auburn gave Freeze a second chance in the SEC.
7. Josh Heupel, Tennessee
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FBS head coaching record: 55-20
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Record at Tennessee: 27-12 (14-10, SEC)
The former Sooner national champion quarterback has made quite the comeback as a coach since being fired as OU’s offensive coordinator after the 2014 season.
From offensive coordinator gigs at Utah State and Missouri, to his first head coaching job at UCF, Heupel reached Rocky Top.
The Volunteers won the Orange Bowl in 2022 and followed that up with a nine-win season in 2023.
6. Steve Sarkisian, Texas
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FBS head coaching record: 71-49
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Record at Texas: 25-14 (17-10, Big 12)
Sarkisian had an unremarkable five-year tenure at Washington. Then he hit rock bottom at Southern Cal, fired not even two seasons into the job.
But after two stints as Alabama’s offensive coordinator under Nick Saban, Sarkisian landed one of the best jobs in college football.
Is Texas back? Sure seems like it.
Sarkisian went 5-7 in Year 1, 8-5 in Year 2 and 12-2 last season as the Longhorns won the Big 12 championship and made the College Football Playoff.
5. Mark Stoops, Kentucky
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FBS head coaching record: 63-65
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Record at Kentucky: 63-65 (30-55, SEC)
Stoops has taken Kentucky to eight straight bowl games. That’s eight bowl games from 2016-23. Kentucky’s eight bowl games before that spanned 40 years, from 1985-2015.
Stoops’ SEC record looks bad on the surface, but consistently winning three-plus SEC games per season at Kentucky — which Stoops has done since 2016 — is no small task.
Stoops flirted with the Texas A&M job, but UK’s all-time winningest coach is back in the Bluegrass for Year 12.
4. Lane Kiffin, Ole Miss
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FBS head coaching record: 95-49
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Record at Ole Miss: 34-15 (20-13, SEC)
Kiffin’s .694 winning percentage at Ole Miss is second best in school history behind John Vaught (.745).
Ole Miss has historically been a bottom-five program in the SEC, and Kiffin has coached the Rebels into contenders.
Safe to say he’s matured since his Tennessee and Southern Cal days. Oh, he’s still quirky, but Kiffin’s schtick is tolerable when he’s winning.
3. Kalen DeBoer, Alabama
From Sioux Falls to Fresno State to Washington, DeBoer has done nothing but win as a head coach.
He went 25-3 in two seasons at Washington, culminating in a national championship game appearance last season.
DeBoer doesn’t have any ties to the Southeast, but neither did Nick Saban until he reeled off a combined seven national championships at LSU and Alabama.
2. Brian Kelly, LSU
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FBS head coaching record: 186-69
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Record at LSU: 20-7 (12-4, SEC)
Among active head coaches, only North Carolina’s Mack Brown (276) and Iowa’s Kirk Ferentz (196) have more wins than Kelly (186). That’s not even counting the 118 games and two national championships Kelly won at Division II Grand Valley State.
Kelly has coached seven consecutive 10-win teams dating back to his last five seasons at Notre Dame and including his first two seasons at LSU.
Kelly’s 113 wins at Notre Dame are the most in program history.
1. Kirby Smart, Georgia
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FBS head coaching record: 94-16
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Record at Iowa State: 94-16 (56-9, SEC)
In all of college football, only three active head coaches have won a national championship: Kirby Smart, Dabo Swinney and Mack Brown.
Smart and Swinney have both won two.
Smart’s resume is ridiculous. Nine SEC losses in eight seasons at Georgia, and of those nine, four of them came in his first season with the Bulldogs.
Georgia is 42-2 (24-0 SEC) in the last three seasons.
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This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: SEC football coach rankings: Where does OU’s Brent Venables fit in?
