It’s only Week 1 of the 2025 college football season, but already the college football hot seat temperature has been turned up a notch. A difficult start to the year sets a tone, especially for coaches who entered the year under a little pressure. So, which head coaches are on the college football hot seat coming out of Week 1?
Dave Aranda, Baylor
The Baylor Bears opened the 2025 college football season on a wave of optimism, but as the game against the Auburn Tigers progressed, it was clearly a case of “same old brand new you” for the Big 12 outfit. Once a bastion of defensive juggernauts, Dave Aranda once again saw his team’s chance of victory dashed by a dismal performance on that side of the ball, falling to a 38-24 loss.
When Baylor won the Big 12 in 2021, the defense allowed just 18.3 points per game. Since then, they’ve never given up fewer than 26.7 points per game. When allowing over 30 points per game under Aranda, they’ve ended the year with a losing record.
An inability to stop the ground game (307 yards, 5.9 yards per carry, and four scores against an Auburn team that averaged just 165.5 rush yards per game) doesn’t bode well for their 2025 campaign, especially with run-heavy offenses like the Utah Utes on the schedule.
There were times early last year when Aranda was considered on the college football hot seat, but a six-game win streak helped alleviate pressure. However, if there isn’t a considerable and swift change in the direction of the defense, his days could be numbered, especially with the amount of talent they’re wasting on the offensive side of the ball.
David Braun, Northwestern
David Braun earned a full-time contract on the back of a miraculous 8-5 campaign in the shadow of the Pat Fitzgerald scandal. However, since the end of that campaign, the Northwestern Wildcats have been arguably one of the worst Power Four programs, picking up just two wins against Big Ten opposition in a four-win 2024 campaign.
Pressure was already mounting on Braun after a season in which the offense ranked 128th in the country with just 17.8 points per game, and the opening to the 2025 campaign doesn’t alleviate any heat from under the college football hot seat on which he sits. Northwestern added former SMU Mustangs passer Preston Stone to kickstart the offense, and the results were catastrophic.
Stone had previously thrown just eight interceptions in his career, but lobbed four picks in the 23-3 defeat to the Tulane Green Wave. The Wildcats limped to just 161 passing yards while no running back broke the 50-yard marker. Since taking the helm, Braun’s Northwestern team has scored 14 points or fewer in 13 games, with eight games under 10 points.
Furthermore, the defense was absolutely routed by new Tulane quarterback Jake Retzlaff, whose 113 rushing yards included a 69-yard rushing score. In two seasons with the BYU Cougars, Retzlaff had never surpassed 81 yards. Offensive inefficiencies and defensive deficiencies could see Braun out of a job before the season is out.
Trent Dilfer, UAB
You’ll struggle to find anyone involved in college football who doesn’t view UAB Blazers head coach Trent Dilfer as being on the college football hot seat. The former Super Bowl-winner arrived in Birmingham with the reputation of being a quarterback-whisperer and fresh off an extraordinary but brief spell as a high school head coach that raised much promise for the team.
In its short spell as an FBS program, UAB has set a certain standard, and under Dilfer, it’s simply failing to live up to that. A once proud team has been gutted and reduced to somewhat of a laughing stock. Rumors of the head coach being on the college football hot seat have been swirling since early November, and there’s been little to suggest a turnaround in fortunes.
The 2023 season, which was the first under Dilfer, yielded just four wins. They took a step back to three wins last fall. UAB has an 8-17 overall record under the former Tampa Bay Buccaneer, three of those wins have come against non-FBS outfits, including the season-opening win over the Alabama State Hornets.
However, the nature of that win casts even more doubt over Dilfer’s ability to bring this UAB team to where it belongs in the college football landscape. The Blazers were 21-17 down at the half, giving up a 31-yard touchdown with just 0:05 on the clock. They slumped to a 28-17 deficit early in the third. Although they came back to record a 52-42 win, the inability to stamp their authority on a team that went 7-5 in 2024 is troubling.
Kalen DeBoer, Alabama
Being the guy after the guy was always going to be an impossible job for whoever took the reins of the Alabama Crimson Tide. Yet, it’s proven to be a poisoned chalice for former Washington Huskies head coach Kalen DeBoer. Some allowances were made for a difficult 2024 season, but the gloves are off following one of the most shocking Week 1 upsets we’ve seen in a very long time.
The eighth-ranked Crimson Tide suffered an absolute shellacking from the Florida State Seminoles on Saturday afternoon. DeBoer’s team lacked ideas or fight on their first-ever trip to Tallahassee, resulting in a 31-17 defeat that actually flatters how dominant Mike Norvell’s much-maligned team was against their SEC foe.
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Florida State dominated Alabama in both trenches, nullifying the Crimson Tide’s run game and sending inexperienced quarterback Ty Simpson scrambling for his life with disturbing regularity. They were listless on defense, allowing the Seminoles’ run game to go to work with relative ease, something that was perhaps more galling due to Thomas Castellanos’ prophetic preseason jibes.
While Tuscaloosa remains something of a fortress, DeBoer’s Alabama team has a legitimate issue going on the road. The Crimson Tide has lost four of the last five outings, and teams are simply not scared in the same way they used to be. Furthermore, Saturday’s defeat was the fourth to an unranked team since his arrival. His predecessor had four unranked losses in his final 16 seasons.
Putting him on the college football hot seat might seem like an overreaction to one defeat, but there’s a bigger picture here.
