Hal Mumme

Hal Mumme has spent nearly 40 years as a football coach at the high school and college levels, including 24 seasons as a college head coach at six different programs from 1989-2012. He is best known for the four years he spent in the SEC as the head coach of the Kentucky Wildcats from 1997-2000, where his Air Raid offense helped Tim Couch blossom into a college superstar. Kentucky finished the ’97 season with a mere 5-6 record, but beat Alabama that year for the first time since 1922.

The Wildcats began the ’98 season with a 68-34 win over in-state rival Louisville and would eventually crack the top-25 in the Coaches’ Poll. UK finished the season 7-5 and an even 4-4 against the SEC, reaching a New Year’s Day bowl for the first time in 47 years when it lost in the Outback Bowl.

After two years as Mumme’s starting quarterback, Couch was taken first overall in the 1999 NFL Draft, and Mumme’s program never fully recovered from losing Couch. Kentucky was just 6-6 in 1999 and once again finished 4-4 in the SEC, eventually losing in the Music City Bowl to end the season. The team plummeted to 2-9 in 2000, failing to win an SEC game in eight tries.

That offseason, Mumme resigned from his job at Kentucky amid swirling allegations of NCAA rules violations, primarily over providing illegal benefits to recruits. He was replaced by his offensive coordinator at the time, Guy Morriss. Mumme left Kentucky with a 20-26 record as coach of the Wildcats, including a 10-22 record in the SEC and an 0-2 record in two bowl appearances.