It will be a few more months before the “definitive grades” of college football coaching hires are in from outlets like ESPN and The Athletic.
That is the nature of the coaching carousel.
Just when you think it is done, Dave Clawson unexpectedly retires as the head coach at Wake Forest, which leads to Jake Dickert leaving Washington State for the Demon Deacons’ job, which now has WSU in the hunt for a new head coach.
So it is safer to wait until February or March to release grades of the coaching hires in the current landscape of college football. It is hard to trust much anymore, what with all the coaching movement, the increasing importance of the transfer portal and the rise of NIL.
That hasn’t stopped a few brave souls from ranking the hires as they’ve happened, though, and that includes Bronco Mendenhall being hired away from New Mexico to become the next head coach of Utah State.
The Aggies, obviously, were thrilled with the hire.
“We needed someone at Utah State, for our football program, who would elevate our competitive excellence, prioritize our academic success and engage as good stewards in our community. Bronco Mendenhall emerged as that leader,” USU athletic director Diana Sabau said at Mendenhall’s introductory press conference.
But how has Mendenhall’s hire been viewed from outside Logan?
CBS Sports
Brandon Marcello has weighed in multiple times on USU’s hire of Mendenhall. To say that he is excited about the hire would be an understatement.
In print, Marcello wrote of the hire: “Mendenhall was a tremendous coach at BYU (99-43 with two Mountain West titles) and jumped to near the top of the country as a hot candidate before leaving for Virginia , where he stepped down suddenly after six seasons. He popped back up this season at New Mexico, leading the program to a 5-7 record. He returns home to his native Utah trying to resurrect the program.”
In an interview on CBS Sports, Marcello went further.
“Easy A for me because of his success at BYU previously,” Marcello said. “Went to Virginia. A very hard job, one of the hardest jobs in the ACC and managed to win there. Actually went to an ACC championship game at one point.”
Marcello added that Mendenhall’s return to New Mexico was, “a really great year,” but went on to say that Utah State feels like the right job for Mendenhall.
“I love the fit,” Marcello said. “For lots of reasons. For one, he’s very familiar with the state of Utah. ... And he’s just a great coach. A great evaluator of talent. ... Perfect hire for Utah State.”
Grade: A
USA Today
The other major outlet that has weighed in on USU’s hire of Mendenhall is USA Today.
Tyler Nettuno, via USA Today affiliate College Sports Wire, was also a fan of Mendenhall’s move to USU, primarily because he sees Mendenhall as a steady option for a program that has had plenty of upheaval over the past year.
“Bronco Mendenhall returned to college football in 2024 after two years away, leading New Mexico to a solid 5-7 finish in Year 1. Now, the former longtime BYU and later Virginia coach is heading back to his home state of Utah to try to rebuild an Aggies program that went 4-8 under interim coach Nate Dreiling. Utah State fired previous coach Blake Anderson for cause relating to alleged Title IX compliance issues, and it will hope the steady hand of Mendenhall — who went 99-43 at BYU with two Mountain West titles and led the Cavaliers to an Orange Bowl appearance — can get the program back on track.”
USA Today’s Paul Myerberg hasn’t graded Mendenhall’s hire this go round — he gave New Mexico an A for landing Mendenhall last winter — but he has graded the season he had with New Mexico.
“All things considered, it was a solid season in Albuquerque,” Myerberg writes, giving the UNM season a B+ grade.
“Mendenhall is already on the move, signing a new deal with Utah State not long after the Lobos’ loss to Hawaii left them one win short of bowl eligibility. The program hadn’t won more than four games in a season since 2016. Losing one of the most consistently successful coaches of this generation is incredibly painful for UNM.
Grade: A
Is anyone else talking about Mendenhall to Utah State?
Others have weighed in with their thoughts on the coaching carousel, including ESPN’s Greg McElroy on his “Always College Football” podcast, and Danny Kannell and Tom Fornelli on the “Cover 3″ podcast.
Both shows talked at length about the new hires at the Group of Five level and each omitted USU’s hire of Mendenhall from the conversation.
While that could be viewed as national media overlooking or ignoring the Aggies, there is another way of thinking about it — Mendenhall’s hire is about as solid as they come and thus not exciting for national pundits who weighed in on, especially given Mendenhall’s hire at New Mexico just last winter.
And in case you’ve forgotten, Mendenhall was pretty roundly praised for being a home run hire at New Mexico when he came out of retirement.