I don’t think anyone rational is turning on him. I do think people are disappointed with the South Carolina game and should be. I also think we have plenty of reasons to be optimistic. I said this elsewhere, but it’s kind of buried in a thread. To those who feel this is the same old rebuild they have seen before, you are wrong. He might still fail, but what he has done with his rebuild in the time he has been here is head and shoulders above the rest.
I haven’t done it yet, but I’m going to go through all of the seasons Kiffin to present and compile a list of games we lost that we should have won. So far with Heupel for sure we have South Carolina but with each of the other guys except maybe Kiffin (we will see) off the top of my head I can think of more than that. The stat details are first but skip to paragraphs at the end if you want the highlights.
After Fulmer was fired our seasons have looked like this:
Kiffin: 7-6 (2009)
Dooley: 6-7, 5-7, 5-7 (2010-12)
Jones: 5-7, 7-6, 9-4, 9-4, 4-8 (2013-17)
Pruitt: 5-7, 8-5, 3-7 (2018-20)
Heupel 7-6, 9-2 (2021-22)*
* Heupel has one regular season game and a bowl left.
Win/Loss/SEC Record:
Kiffin: 7-6, 4-4 SEC
Dooley: 16-21, 5-19 SEC
Jones: 34-29, 14-26 SEC
Pruitt: 16-19, 10-16 SEC
Heupel:16-8, 9-6 SEC*
* Heupel has one SEC game left
Peak SEC Rank:
Kiffin: #3 SEC East
Dooley: #4 SEC East
Jones: #2 SEC East
Pruitt: #3 SEC East
Heupel: #2 SEC East
Bowl Record:
Kiffin: 0-1 (L Chic-Fil-A Bowl)
Dooley: 0-1 (L Music City Bowl)
Jones: 3-0 (W TaxSlayer Bowl, W OutBack Bowl, W Music City Bowl)
Pruitt: 1-0 (W Gator Bowl)
Heupel: 0-1* (L Music City Bowl, TBD*)
* Heupel is eligible for his second bowl but it hasn’t been played yet)
Best Rankings:
Kiffin: NR
Dooley: #23 AP (2012)
Jones: #9 AP (2016)
Pruitt: #16 AP (2019)
Heupel: #1 CFP (2022)
Total Weeks Ranked:
Kiffin: 0 (Never)
Dooley: 1 (2012)
Jones : 12 (2015, 2016)
Pruitt: 2 (2019)
Heupel: 10 (2022)*
*Heupel has one regular season game and a bowl game left so more weeks ranked are likely to be added.
Total Ranked Wins:
Kiffin: 1 (#21 South Carolina)
Dooley: 0*
Jones: 5 (#11 South Carolina, #19 Georgia, #13 Northwestern, #19 Florida, #25 Georgia
Pruitt: 2 (#21 Auburn, #12 Kentucky)
Heupel: 6 (#18 Kentucky, #17 Pittsburgh, #20 Florida, #25 LSU, #3 Alabama, #19 Kentucky)
* Dooley technically beat #12 Montana, which would be cool if it was an FBS team and not FCS. Some other guys beat some ranked FCS too but hey, let’s call out Dooley in the asterisk.
Best Ranked Win:
Kiffin: #21 South Carolina
Dooley: None
Jones: #11 South Carolina
Pruitt: #12 Kentucky
Heupel: #3 Alabama
Heupel has the highest number of ranked wins at 6, the highest ranked win over #3 Alabama (only coach to beat that team), is second at 10 weeks as a ranked team to Jones with 12 with weeks to go in this season, has the highest rank achieved at #1 and the only top 5 rank achieved.
He is tied with Jones for the highest SEC East finish at #2 having achieved it once in 2022, his second season, but Jones did achieve in twice in 2015-16, his third and fourth seasons. There is an 2022 SEC East game left to play but it doesn’t affect the East race.
He is the only coach except Kiffin with a winning SEC record at 9-6 compared to Kiffin’s 4-4. His total number of SEC wins is third: Jones has 14, Pruitt 10, Heupel 9, Dooley, 4 and Kiffin 4.
He has been to one bowl and lost but is bowl eligible again in his second season with results TBD. He is second in bowl eligible seasons with 2 next to Jones who had 3, whereas everyone else has 1. Jones leads bowl wins with a 3-0 record, Pruitt comes in at second with 1-0, and the rest of the field is currently tied at 0-1. If Heupel wins he will match Pruitt in wins but have appeared in more bowls. If he loses he will remain tied with the others without a bowl win, but still two straight appearances in his first two seasons.
All of these accomplishments have happened in 24 games. Jones had 63, Dooley 37, Pruitt 35, and Kiffin 13.
