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  • Ryan Silverfield Has Never Coached A Positive Strength Of Schedule. Arkansas Just Handed Him The SEC Gauntlet.

Ryan Silverfield Has Never Coached A Positive Strength Of Schedule. Arkansas Just Handed Him The SEC Gauntlet.

Plus: Jon Sumrall makes the hire Billy Napier never did. Tulane reveals how they really see themselves. And Sherrone Moore goes from fired to arrested in a matter of hours.

Author

Mark Haines
December 12, 2025

In partnership with

IN THIS ISSUE

Well, the Sherrone Moore story took a turn none of us expected. Fired late Wednesday afternoon. Team and staff meetings followed—without him. Then, shortly after, he was in handcuffs. We've got the latest on what happened and a link to the breakdown of the contract implications for both Moore and U of M.

I'm also keeping an eye on the private equity wave hitting college athletics. A Republican congressman just put every school exploring these deals on notice, and I think this becomes a bigger story as the year goes on.

In our Deep Dives this week, three coaching hires tell very different stories about how programs see themselves. Ryan Silverfield has never coached a positive strength of schedule, and Arkansas just handed him the SEC gauntlet. Jon Sumrall made a staff hire that shows he understands what Billy Napier never quite figured out. And Tulane? They made the playoffs, had real leverage, and still went with a .318 coach. That one's been on my mind all week.

Appreciate you reading. Let's get into it.

—Mark

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BEST LINKS

The Sherrone Moore Situation Just Got Worse

Michigan fired Moore on Wednesday after discovering "credible evidence" of an inappropriate relationship with a staff member.

Hours later, he was in handcuffs.

Saline Police detained Moore Wednesday night and handed him over to Pittsfield Township authorities for "investigation into potential charges." He was booked into Washtenaw County Jail at 8:30 p.m. ET. No charges have been filed yet.

Pittsfield Township Police confirmed they're investigating an alleged assault that occurred Wednesday afternoon at 4:10 p.m. local time—between the firing and the arrest. Their statement said the incident "does not appear to be random in nature."

Inside Otro Capital's Utah Partnership

College.town published a deep dive on Otro Capital following the firm's new partnership with Utah athletics. The profile covers the company's investment track record, leadership backgrounds, and strategic questions the deal raises for Utah and college athletics at large.

If you're trying to understand the private equity wave hitting college sports, this is a solid primer.

Congress Is Watching These PE Deals

On the heels of Utah's partnership with Otro Capital, Rep. Michael Baumgartner (R-WA) issued a warning: "Congress will be taking a hard look at the tax-exempt status of universities that enter into private equity deals. If you want to act like a non-public entity, you better be ready to be treated like one."

Worth monitoring as more programs explore this funding model.

JOIN OUR BOWL CHALLENGE

Our friends at the Targeting Winners podcast are in on the Capital One Bowl Mania challenge this year - and they've invited Coaches Hot Seat readers to join the group.

The setup: three contest modes (Standard, Spread, and Confidence). Go perfect in any of them, and you could walk away with up to $1 million. Miss perfection? There are still $20,000 grand prizes for each mode.

It's free, it's fun, and it gives us all something to argue about through bowl season.

DEEP DIVE

Ryan Silverfield Is 2-4 Against Ranked Teams. He's Never Coached A Positive Strength Of Schedule. Arkansas Just Handed Him The SEC Gauntlet.

Ryan Silverfield is a solid coach.

He went 50-25 at Memphis. Bowl eligible every season. Back-to-back double-digit win years in 2023 and 2024. A perfect 4-0 in bowl games. By raw numbers, he's one of the winningest coaches in college football over the last three seasons.

But the splits tell a different story.

Against ranked teams? He's 2-4. Against opponents above .500 on the road? He's 3-12. And here's the detail that should worry every Arkansas fan: every single season at Memphis, Silverfield coached against a negative strength of schedule. The AAC was soft. The wins came against teams he was supposed to beat.

Arkansas doesn't work that way.

The SEC gauntlet includes Georgia, LSU, Tennessee, Texas, and Texas A&M—every year. The Razorbacks' strength of schedule under Pittman averaged +3 to +7. Memphis averaged -3 to -5. That's an 8-10 point swing in difficulty that Silverfield has never navigated.

And the reaction tells you everything:

He'll stabilize the floor. He'll get Arkansas back to bowl games. But the ceiling? The data says 7-8 wins is the most likely outcome—and in the SEC, that gets you fired.

High floor. Low ceiling. Short leash.

Jon Sumrall Just Made The Hire Billy Napier Never Did

When Florida hired Jon Sumrall, the question wasn't whether his scheme could work in the SEC.

The film shows pro-style concepts: play-action, deep overs, vertical posts, that translate anywhere. The question was whether he'd bring the right people to run it.

His answer: Buster Faulkner.

Faulkner comes from Georgia Tech, but before that he was on Kirby Smart's staff at Georgia. He's been in the SEC. He's recruited against Florida. He knows what it takes to compete in this league.

This is a different approach than Billy Napier took.

Napier promoted from within and leaned on his Louisiana network. When the pressure mounted, he didn't have voices in the room who'd operated at the top of the SEC, coaches who'd seen what it takes to compete with Georgia and Alabama week in, week out.

Sumrall went and got one.

One hire doesn't guarantee success. But it shows Sumrall understands the assignment: Florida isn't Troy with more resources. It's a different job entirely.

That awareness alone is an upgrade.

Tulane Had CFP Leverage. They Hired A .318 Coach. Here's What That Tells Us About Program Identity.

Making the College Football Playoff changes everything.

It validates your system. It attracts recruits. It gives you leverage to hire almost anyone. Tulane had all of that, and then promoted Will Hall, a coach who went 14-30 at Southern Miss and was fired mid-season after a 1-6 start.

The "continuity" argument died on arrival.

The surface-level logic makes sense.

Hall was OC under Willie Fritz in 2019. He knows the building. He won't bolt after one good year. But continuity isn't a strategy, it's a comfort blanket.

When you make the playoffs, you can attract:

  • Rising Power Four coordinators

  • Hot Group of Five names

  • Coaches with actual FBS head coaching wins

Tulane had the leverage to swing big.

Instead, they told everyone exactly how they see themselves.

The hire tells recruits: We're not sure this lasts. The hire tells donors: We're managing expectations, not building. The hire tells the coach: The bar is survival, not excellence.

Their own fanbase is calling it "the worst hire of the cycle."

Hall now enters with zero margin for error.

No credibility cushion. A hostile fanbase. CFP-level expectations he's never proven he can meet. The pressure is immediate, and the goodwill is gone before he's coached a single game.

They revealed they don't believe in their own upward trajectory…and that might be the biggest problem of all.

THAT’S A WRAP

Before you go…

The Sherrone Moore story is going to dominate the conversation for a while. It's a big story, and we'll keep covering it as it develops. But I'd ask you to keep something in mind: there's a family behind this. A wife. Kids. People who didn't choose any of this and are now living through it publicly. The story matters. So does remembering that.

On a lighter note, Tuesday's issue is shaping up nicely. We've got more coaching hire profiles coming, and a few of them have stories worth telling. If you found something useful in today's newsletter, I'd appreciate it if you forwarded it to a friend who might enjoy it too. Word of mouth is how we grow, and I don't take it for granted.

Talk Tuesday.

—Mark

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