2024 ACC Head Coach Rankings: Where Does Virginia Tech Head Coach Brent Pry Land?
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1. Jeff Brohm
This pick might be a surprise to some, but it just makes sense. Although he came just short of a conference championship and a bowl game last year, Brohm knows how to win. In his first year at Louisville, he led the Cardinals to their first 10-win season in the ACC, and their first championship game appearance since the Cardinals took a share of the Big East in 2012. Unlike some other coaches in the ACC, Brohm can utilize any talent on the roster, and gets the absolute best out of his players, and he can win with whoever is on his team.
The only question for Brohm is the recruiting, where I’d like to point something out: yes, it is true that Louisville has been underperforming in high school recruiting since he took over, but his transfer portal success is undeniable. On3 rated Louisville as the best team in the transfer portal in 2024, and Brohm has the Cardinals looking scary for next year. True program builder.
2. Dabo Swinney
Dabo is the most undeniable head coach in the ACC. He's unfireable and has built Clemson into a blue blood of college football. Two national championships, countless bowl wins; Dabo practically owns Clemson, South Carolina, he’s not going anywhere. Although Clemson has slightly fallen from the glory they once had, they are still atop the ACC and will certainly compete for a conference title. I wouldn’t be shocked if it only takes a few years for the Tigers to become National contenders again.
In that case, Dabo will reclaim his spot at number one, however for the foreseeable future I have more full trust in Jeff Brohm.
3. Mike Norvell
I’m torn on how to feel about Mike Norvell, on one hand he was handed a crumbling Florida State program, and turned them around pretty quickly, and just missed out on the playoffs. On the other hand, he’s struggled in conference outside of last year, with a 12-13 record, but that could also be a product of what he was given. The way Norvell can move up this list is his performance this year. Now that most of the pieces are gone from his miracle run last year, what can he do now?
This is how elite coaches are made, through tests and trials, and we’ll see how Norvell can perform this year.
4. Dave Doeren
Dave Doeren is certainly the most underrated coach in the ACC, but he has gotten some well-deserved love in the past offseason. In Dave’s eleven years at NC State, he has only has two losing seasons. His first losing season was in 2013, his first season with the program, and the other coming in 2019 when NC State had no consistency at quarterback. Outside of those two years, Doeren has won seven or more games every year.
Doeren consistently produces NFL talent, and to become a top-10 coach in the country he’ll probably have to find more postseason success. He’s only won three bowl games at NC State, and hasn’t picked up a bowl win since the Independence Bowl in 2016.
5. Mack Brown
This is another ranking that might surprise people, since Mack has dropped in most ACC coaching rankings, dropping from No. 4 to No. 7 in CBS Sports’ ACC coach rankings. His success is undeniable, one of the only current coaches with a National Championship, and a resumé which speaks for itself. Mack Brown has consistently led North Carolina to being a top team in the ACC, jumping from two wins to seven wins the first year he was hired.
His next step will be finding more success outside of the regular season, as he has only won a single bowl game and should look to find more positives in his ACC career.
6. Dave Clawson
The ever so great Dave Clawson, the coach who established a winning culture at Wake Forest, and was once hailed as one of the best in the ACC. He has taken a considerable step back, winning only four games last year, with one win in conference, a team that featured an abysmal offense, one of the worst in the ACC.
Clawson certainly has Wake Forest in the middle of a rebuild, the question is how long will it take to get Wake Forest back to the standard that he set?
7. Mario Cristobal
The discourse around Mario Cristobal will always be interesting. He’s an amazing recruiter, a coach who has rebuilt programs, and a coach who has led teams to big wins, like his 2019 win in the Rose Bowl. I think Cristobal is best fit as a recruiter though. He did an amazing job recruiting during his time at Alabama, Oregon, and FIU, and has continued the same standard during his time at Miami. The problem is, it doesn’t matter how well you recruit if you can’t win with the players you have.
In the two years Cristobal has been the head coach at Miami, he’s made egregious in-game decisions and has underperformed heavily in both years, finishing with a 12-13 record in that span. Cristobal completely threw a game away against Georgia Tech last year, and is becoming known as a coach who performs better on the recruiting trail than the football field. The only two reasons he’s above Brent Pry in this list is his ability to recruit and his previous success at Oregon. If Cristobal can’t put it together this year? Best believe that Brent Pry is moving up the list.
8. Brent Pry
Brent Pry, a coach who has actually turned into a polarizing figure in ACC coaching talks, is entering his third year with the Hokies. Brent Pry took over after Justin Fuente’s stint with the program, marking Pry’s first ever head coaching opportunity. He inherited a team that needed a lot of work, position groups that weren’t hashed out, and just generally the worst spot the program had been in since the 50s. Pry has found success though, turning a three-win team in his first year to a seven-win team the next.
HIs expectations are very high for this year as well, my only look for him to progress as a coach is to find some more consistency in recruiting. Virginia Tech had a top ten recruiting class in the ACC in 2024, and they’re around that same mark currently for the 2025 class. Pry has done a lot with the talent he has though, and could help lead Virginia Tech to a great year next year. It’s hard to find bad aspects of Brent Pry’s coaching, and he certainly could shoot up these rankings if Virginia Tech lives up to their expectations in 2024.
9. Rhett Lashlee
Lashlee is a hard coach to rank. He’s led SMU to the top tiers of the AAC, and has recruited in the 2025 class very well, after a more than disappointing class in the 2024 cycle. This will be Lashlee’s first season in the ACC, in what are some very untested waters. He’s only faced one ACC team in his head coaching career, Boston College – in a loss at the Fenway Bowl. Also, he hasn't even won a single game against any Power Four school, matter of a fact he’s 0-6 against Power Four teams. This could be very worrying in the 2024 season, as SMU only faces two non-Power Four opponents, Nevada and Houston Baptist.
It’s not all bad though, his rebuild of SMU is undeniable. An 18-9 record is nothing to sneeze at, neither is being ranked in the final AP Poll as a Group of Five team.
10. Brent Key
The unending parallels between Brent Pry and Brent Key will always be interesting: both went from a losing record to a 7-6 record in their second season, both coach at “Tech” schools in the ACC, both are named Brent with a three-letter surname that ends in ‘y’, both bring similar attitudes to coaching and addressing the media, and the list goes on. Brent Key found himself slightly lower on this list than his counterpart at Virginia Tech. Brent Key took over in the middle of the 2022 season after the departure of Geoff Collins, and hasn’t looked back. He led Georgia Tech to its first bowl win since 2016, and has the Yellow Jackets in a pretty solid place. He has also recruited pretty well, as Georgia Tech is currently ranked 5th in 247Sports’ 2025 Recruit Rankings for the 2025 recruiting class.
It hasn’t been perfect though, Georgia Tech suffered some embarrassing losses in Brent Key’s first full year as head coach. The Yellow Jackets dropped two-possession games to Bowling Green and Boston College, and had their defense completely torched against Clemson. Overall, he’s led Georgia Tech to a better place than it has been in recent history, it’ll be interesting to see where Key goes with it now.
11. Pat Narduzzi
Earlier this offseason, I wrote about how I thought Brent Pry should be ranked ahead of Rhett Lashlee and Manny Diaz in CBS Sports coach rankings, but I think Pry should've passed Narduzzi as well. Pat has found plenty of success at Pitt, but it seems like the program is in a constant downfall now. 2023 marked the first year since 2019 where Pitt was never ranked in the AP Poll. Pitt will be battling to make a bowl game this year, and I wouldn’t be shocked if they finish with around only four wins.
12. Bill O’Brien
Some writers, fans, and publications seem to be much higher on Bill O’Brien entering the 2024 season than I am. He overtakes a Boston College program who has been middling in the ACC for years. From 2013 to 2023, Boston College never won more than seven games, and never won less than three. It’s very hard to gauge what O’Brien will do with this program that he’s being handed. Bill hasn’t been a head coach in the NCAA in over ten years, and just had a less than ideal stint with the New England Patriots as offensive coordinator. He had a polarizing career with the Houston Texans after he left Penn State after claiming, “I'm not a one-and-done guy. I made a commitment to these players at Penn State and that's what I am going to do. I'm not gonna cut and run after one year, that's for sure,” and then he left the year after.
I frankly don’t know how to feel about the signing, and it is really a boom-or-bust by Boston College. It’s entirely possible that the Eagles can never get over the hump, but it’s also plausible that O’Brien could lead them to a fair share of success in the ACC.
13. Manny Diaz
Manny Diaz has certainly had an interesting coaching career, and he’s been put in an interesting spot again this year. Diaz was the defensive coordinator at Miami for three years, inventing the turnover chain, and helping the Hurricanes become one of the best defenses. He was then hired to become Temple’s new head coach, but then backed out to return to Miami as a head coach. His stint was less than desirable, posting a 21-15 record through three seasons, and disappointed Hurricanes fans until he eventually was fired.
Diaz has now been thrown into the fire at Duke, as former head coach Mike Elko was hired to lead Texas A&M’s football program. Duke lost a lot of talent in the transfer portal this offseason, like running back Jordan Waters to NC State, edge rusher RJ Oben to Notre Dame, quarterback Riley Leonard also to Notre Dame, and defensive lineman Aeneas Peebles to Virginia Tech. Diaz is in an interesting position, one where it seems he’s set up to fail.
14. Fran Brown
I don’t dislike this hire like others do. I do think this will be an interesting position for Fran Brown though as this is his first time in a role like this, he’s never had full control as a coordinator, and has never been a head coach. With that being said, Brown has used the transfer portal effectively, and has a fairly easy schedule heading into the 2024 season. He could definitely make some noise this year, but I’m not sold until he can show that on a year-to-year basis.
15. Justin Wilcox
I think Justin Wilcox marks the beginning of the lowest-tier coaches on this list. Wilcox has had an interesting career at Cal, and 2024 could certainly be his last year. He has never posted a winning record in the conference, and only has one bowl win in seven years. The recruiting is at an all-time low and it is safe to say that Justin Wilcox and the Golden Bears will probably not take the ACC by storm next year.
16. Troy Taylor
Taylor is probably the coach in this lowest-tier that has the most room to move upwards, frankly because he is such an untested coach. I will give him that he was handed a team that was already bad, but last year was a mixed bag at the best. The defense was frankly horrible. Stanford gave up 37.7 points per game, the second worst at the FBS level, and lost to Cal and Sacramento State. The schedule was hard though, very hard, and probably one of the hardest in the country. Stanford faced #5 Washington, #6 USC, #9 Oregon, #12 Oregon State, #17 Notre Dame, #25 UCLA, and Colorado who peaked at #18 in the AP Poll.
Stanford actually pulled off a huge upset against Deion Sanders’ Colorado team, and if Taylor can build on that success, he could be much higher on this list.
17. Tony Elliott
The title for worst head coach in the ACC I would hand to Tony Elliott. In his two years at Virginia, Elliott has never won more than three games, he’s struggled to land top level talent, and he hasn’t done much with the talent that he already has on the roster. His main call to fame was his fairly solid defense in 2022, but that same defense took a significant hit in 2023 and it doesn’t seem like there is much to build on in Charlottesville. I again, would most definitely not be shocked if this is his last year in Virginia, and wouldn’t doubt the fact that he could get fired mid-season.
Tough looks in Charlottesville.
RJ Schafer joined the On SI team in 2024, contributing to the coverage of Major League Baseball, Collegiate Basketball, and Collegiate Football at https://www.si.com/college/virginiatech/. Prior to this, RJ built a strong portfolio covering Georgia Tech and the Tigers for the Bleav Network. With a solid background in sports journalism, RJ has conducted interviews with both collegiate and professional athletes, enhancing the depth and authenticity of his reporting. RJ's extensive experience in the sports industry has equipped him with a keen understanding of the dynamics and intricacies of both collegiate and professional sports. His work is focused on providing insightful analysis and comprehensive coverage, making him a trusted voice in the sports community.
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