Legendary college football coach retires 42 years after first job

Arlington, TX, USA; Arlington Renegades head coach Bob Stoops on the sidelines during the first half against the San Antonio Brahmas at Choctaw Stadium. | Raymond Carlin III-Imagn Images

Bob Stoops, the coach who rebuilt Oklahoma into a national power and later moved into spring-league pro football, announced Monday that he is retiring from coaching. 

Stoops, 65, stepped away after the Arlington Renegades’ 2025 season, a campaign that ended with a 5-5 record and no UFL playoff berth.

Despite the disappointing 2025 finish, Stoops’ coaching resume is among the most consequential of the BCS/modern era. 

At Oklahoma from 1999 through 2016, he compiled an overall record of 191-48, led the Sooners to the 2000 BCS national championship, and won 10 Big 12 titles.

The Sooners played in a bowl game every season under Stoops and produced multiple All-Americans, Heisman winners, and dozens of NFL draft picks, notably Jason White, Sam Bradford, Adrian Peterson, DeMarco Murray, Baker Mayfield, and Trent Williams.

Stoops’ program regularly competed at or near the sport’s summit for nearly two decades.

Bob Stoops is retiring from coaching. He has spent the last four years with the Dallas Renegades of the UFL, winning the XFL Championship in 2023. In 18 seasons at Oklahoma, Stoops went 191-48, winning 10 Big 12 titles and the 2000 BCS national championship.

— Todd Archer (@toddarcher) December 15, 2025

After a stint coaching in spring football that culminated with the Arlington Renegades winning the 2023 XFL Championship, Stoops spent the last several years guiding the franchise through the UFL’s early cycles. 

The Renegades’ 2025 campaign began promisingly, hit a midseason slide, and closed evenly, scoring 229 total points while allowing 168 (+61 point difference).

Before the UFL and previously at Oklahoma, Stoops spent 16 years as an assistant and defensive coordinator at Iowa, Kent State, Kansas State, and Florida.

Oklahoma Sooners wide receiver Drake Stoops poses for a photo with his father, former Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops, and his mother, Carol Stoops, during Senior Day before a college football game between the University of Oklahoma Sooners (OU) and the TCU Horned Frogs at Gaylord Family-Oklahoma Memorial Stadium in Norman, Oklahoma | BRYAN TERRY/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK

Stoops' retirement matters on multiple levels. 

Practically, the Renegades lose a proven leader, and the UFL loses a high-profile coaching name that helped draw attention and credibility. 

Spring football has struggled for decades to establish a stable, profitable model in North America, with the AAF, earlier UFL iterations, and the XFL all having folded due to financial issues.

Losing Stoops reduces one of the league’s veteran signposts at a delicate moment, a league whose viewership dropped 30% from 2024.

Although Stoops has been absent from Power Five sidelines for years, his legacy in Norman and across college football remains strong.

Taken together, Monday’s announcement is the closing of a notable chapter in American football’s coaching history.

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