The Arizona State football program has climbed out of college football purgatory in what could be record pace.
The 2022 season resulted in the firing of Herm Edwards just three games into the year, and it felt as if the looming NCAA investigation was just days away from sinking the program at any given time.
In came Kenny Dillingham – an Arizona native and Sun Devil alum that injected the program with sorely missed energy.
The coach took the program from a 3-9 2023 season to 11 victories and a top 10 finish last season – that turnaround has consistently placed the guru amongst the elite coaches in the sport according to pundits.
Tom Fornelli of CBS Sports, along with a panel of fellow experts did the seemingly impossible task of ranking the best coaches in college football – and gave Dillingham the number 18 spot.
“Dillingham began coaching long after we began ranking coaches here, and his place among the ranks has varied wildly! That’s the kind of thing that happens when you take over anArizona Stateprogram in a bad spot, go 3-9 in your first year, then shock the world by going 11-3 the next season while winning the Big 12 your first year in the league. When that happens, you climb higher in the rankings than any other coach that year. Dillingham jumps 46 spots! That’s 18 more than the next-highest coach.”
The third-year head coach comes into the season as the fifth best coach in the Big 12 conference in this exercise – behind Kansas’ Lance Leipold, Kansas State’s Chris Klieman, Utah’s Kyle Whittingham, and Iowa State’s Matt Campbell.
Dillingham admittedly faced much skepticism when he became a head coach of a power five program at the age of 32 – those questions no longer linger nearly three years in.
The Arizona State alum has built an incredible coaching staff from top-to-bottom, has built a culture of collectivism within the Sun Devil locker room, has reinvigorated an alumni base that had been indifferent for years, and managed to electrify a student body in ways that previous coaches could only dream of.
As for the football field – Dillingham’s current legacy is as simple as following the development of Sam Leavitt and Jordyn Tyson into legitimate NFL prospects over the last year. Read more about each of their standings as prospects here and here.
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