$45 Million Head Coach Clearly Challenges College Football Calendar

A head coach at Power Four college football program has sent a strong message against the current college football calendar.

Ole Miss Rebels head coach Pete Golding and Tulane head coach Jon Sumrall embrace prior to the game | Petre Thomas-Imagn Images

College football has encountered its fair share of problems with a recent wave of changes sweeping across the sport.

The College Football Playoff expanded to a 12-team field in 2024 and does not show signs of staying put in the years to come. Additionally, the introduction of NIL, coupled with the NCAA transfer portal in 2021, collaterally damaged preexisting elements of college football.

One aspect of college football that has suffered in the midst of recent changes is its calendar. The NCAA did away with the spring transfer window after 2025, but the lone two-week window in 2026 opened on the final day of bowls and closed three days before the College Football Playoff National Championship game.

In addition to the window's inconvenience, players on bowl-eligible teams continue to opt out of bowl games to transfer prior to the opening.

Coaches have also been impacted by the calendar's current flaws. Most programs hire their next coaches in the week following the end of the regular season, something that presents an inconvenience to head coaches trying to finish out postseasons with their teams.

The most notorious example of a coach wanting to finish out a season was Lane Kiffin. While the calendar was somewhat to blame, a major part of the problem for Kiffin was the fact that he was heading to one of Ole Miss' biggest SEC rivals in LSU.

Kiffin was not the only coach to accept a job elsewhere while finishing a job with a College Football Playoff team. Former Tulane coach Jon Sumrall was allowed to coach the Green Wave after he had accepted the vacancy left by Billy Napier at Florida.

Tulane Green Wave head coach Jon Sumrall on the field prior to a game Mississippi Rebels at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. | Petre Thomas-Imagn Images

Like Kiffin, Sumrall has expressed discontent with the calendar structure in college football. He discussed potential changes on a recent edition of "The Triple Option" podcast with Rob Stone, Mark Ingram II and Urban Meyer.

"I love the expanded playoff. I’m great with it. It doesn’t bother me at all that there’s maybe more access. When Urban [Meyer] was coaching, you had two losses, and you were out. Now, what’s changed in our world, obviously, we’ve gone to nine SEC games, which has made this league even more brutal, almost," Sumrall said.

"Not that it was easy before. I do think if we could start the season, maybe everybody week zero, start the playoff a little earlier. Those sort of things, I think, would be helpful to get the end of the championship season closer to January 1.”

Sumrall's ascent up the college football head coaching ranks was a quick one. He spent two seasons apiece at Troy and Tulane, compiling a 43-12 overall record and winning three conference championships in the last four seasons. He takes the reins at a Florida program that posted a 4-8 overall record in 2025, its worst mark since 2013.