College Football Network ranked the 13 first time head coaches from 2024.
Vincent has flipped a Warhawks team mired in mediocrity into an outfit capable of causing an upset on any given Saturday. After finishing 2-10 in 2023, he led them to a 5-7 season that looked like it would culminate in a bowl berth for the first time since 2018.
Sadly, that wasn’t to be after a losing streak down the back stretch of the season. Yet, no other first-year head coach had greater success improving their conference record than Vincent this year. After going 0-8 in Sun Belt play a year ago, the Warhawks tallied wins against Troy, James Madison, and the Southern Miss Golden Eagles.
Detractors will point to the second half of the season. Still, Vincent’s Louisiana-Monroe team played a one-score game against the eventual conference champions and kept the bowl-bound Arkansas State Red Wolves honest on the road. They also increased their offensive and defensive performance year-on-year despite returning just 33% of their 2023 production.
1) Bryant Vincent, Louisiana-Monroe
So, to the top of our first-year head coach rankings. No one, and I mean no one, has done more with less in 2024 than Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks head coach Bryant Vincent. It speaks volumes about him as a leader that UAB Blazers fans wanted him to remain in Birmingham after his 2022 season as the interim head coach, and he’s proven his value in his first full-time campaign.Vincent has flipped a Warhawks team mired in mediocrity into an outfit capable of causing an upset on any given Saturday. After finishing 2-10 in 2023, he led them to a 5-7 season that looked like it would culminate in a bowl berth for the first time since 2018.
Sadly, that wasn’t to be after a losing streak down the back stretch of the season. Yet, no other first-year head coach had greater success improving their conference record than Vincent this year. After going 0-8 in Sun Belt play a year ago, the Warhawks tallied wins against Troy, James Madison, and the Southern Miss Golden Eagles.
Detractors will point to the second half of the season. Still, Vincent’s Louisiana-Monroe team played a one-score game against the eventual conference champions and kept the bowl-bound Arkansas State Red Wolves honest on the road. They also increased their offensive and defensive performance year-on-year despite returning just 33% of their 2023 production.
