With 3 defeats, is a once promising season for Baylor lost under Dave Aranda?
Coming off a 42-36 defeat at the hands of rival TCU on Saturday for their third loss of the 2025 campaign, should the Baylor Bears' athletic administration be concerned? The fan base on social media is in an uproar and want, scratch that, are demanding a change in leadership with regards to the head football coach.
Dave Aranda is in his sixth season as the head man of the Baylor football program, after he served as the defensive coordinator at LSU and hoisted a national championship in 2019. Under Aranda, the Tigers were ranked as a top 30 unit in most defensive categories that season.
Aranda is known throughout the coaching circles as a defensive guru, a zin master if you will when it comes to stopping opponents’ offensive machines it its tracks.
In his second year on the job (2021), Aranda led the Bears to a 12-2 record and a Big 12 Conference championship. That defense allowed 18 points per game and was ranked in the top ten in the FBS in sacks and tackles for loss.
Fast forward to 2025. Since that conference championship season, Aranda has regressed and posted a 21-24 record. He has posted just one winning season since, an 8-5 record last season and a bowl game loss to LSU.
Baylor (4-3) came into this season with a lot of hype and big expectations. 18 starters returned. One national college football analyst, Phil Steele, picked the Bears to win the Big 12 this season.
Baylor has a win over a ranked opponent in their 48-45 road win over then No. 17 SMU (5-2). Two of their three losses this season are by a combined nine points (Arizona State and TCU).
Hold on to your seats folks cause Sawyer is slingin' it ⚡️
— Baylor Football (@BUFootball) September 6, 2025
425 yards. 4 TD's. Tie ballgame.#SicEm pic.twitter.com/8y2ogavtPi
After seven games, here are Baylor’s national defensive rankings:
- 107th in total defense
- 78th passing defense
- 112th rushing defense
- 126th in turnover margin
- 90th in opponent 3rd down conversions
- 118th in scoring defense
- 121st in sacks
- 109th in tackles for loss
- 54th in INTs
The schedule for the remainder of the season is not void of road blocks to a successful turnaround. Baylor travels to take on No. 21 Cincinnati (6-1) next Saturday, then hosts Utah (5-2) and Houston (6-1) in November. As of today, those three opponents have a combined 17-4 record.
This week alone, we have seen two head coaches get fired with similar coaching performances. Billy Napier was fired today after the Florida Gators struggled to win just their third game of the season, against four losses, vs. Mississippi State.
Earlier in the week, James Franklin was let go from Penn State after the Nittany Lions suffered three straight losses, two to unranked opponents. Coming into this season, Penn State was ranked No. 2 in the preseason Top 25 poll and picked to win the Big Ten by Steele.
With three losses, quarterback Sawyer Robertson still leads the nation in passing yards and passing yards per game, but is being wasted because of a poor defense.
Aranda should be walking the sidelines wearing fire-retardant clothing. Another loss by the Bears and Aranda could be chatting up Napier and Franklin while standing in the unemployment line.
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Tony comes to On SI with six years of experience writing about sports online. His work has been published on such sites as The Gridiron News, Mike Farrell Sports, YardBarker, Athlon Sports and College Football Backers. Tony is a U.S. Air Force veteran and is a member of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA).