2005-12-15

Who is college football's winningest coach?

As the build up to January 3rd's Orange Bowl begins the one story you can be sure the media will run with is that the two head coaches stand at 1 and 2 in terms of total wins (not that I blame them, there is very little else that is compelling about this matchup). 'Course everyone knows that Daddy Bowden is #1 (with 359), and JoePa is a very close second (with 353), right? Only thing is that, may not be right.

See, Bowden accumulated 31 one of his victories at Samford College, which did not play in Division 1-A at the time. Samford currently plays in Division 1-AA. But because of a quirk in the NCAA rule book those 31 wins count as 1-A victories, and thus Bowden is Division 1-A's all time winningest coach, except he's really not. Follow?

John Gagliardi, St. John's University of Minnesota head coach (Division III), holds the current record for most wins by a head coach (549). I'm no rocket scientest but I'm pretty sure Bowden should not be able to lay claim to all time winningest coach in all divisions or just Division 1-A.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Yea i would agree with that Bowden is the all time D 1 wins leader. And Joe Pa is the all time winnest coach in Major college football. But the St. john's coach in the winnest coach I have always said that and I am glad someone backs me up.