Top 5 non-Bobby Petrino candidates to be the next Arkansas coach
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Sam Pittman lasted 6 years at a job that many assumed would chew him up and spit him out. The Arkansas coach got the program out of the Chad Morris era successfully, but it ended as the vast majority of SEC jobs do. That is, searching for someone else after a firing.
After Sunday’s news that Pittman is out in Year 6 in Fayetteville, the natural assumption is that interim coach Bobby Petrino will be the lead candidate to get the job he once had, but then … you know. We don’t need to revisit the motorcycle/neck-brace moment that brought us here.
Let’s say that Pittman’s replacement is in fact external. There’s a long list of candidates who would make sense at a job that’s better than when he was hired.
So who would make the most sense? Let’s discuss these 5 candidates:
1. Alex Golesh, USF head coach
Golesh should be on any sort of short list for a variety of obvious factors. His Year 3 began with statement wins against Boise State and at Florida, and a loss to No. 2 Miami (FL) is the lone blemish to speak of. There’s also the background of working with Josh Heupel both at UCF and Tennessee, which has allowed the offensive-minded coach to be at the controls of a proven SEC offensive system. Golesh has an extremely unique background as a first-generation American who arrived from Moscow (USSR) and fell in love with college football while living in Brooklyn. He spent 2 decades rising through the ranks to become one of the top up-and-coming coaches.
And just in case that wasn’t attractive enough to the Hogs, his wife, Alexis, is from Arkansas. She visits there monthly, where she does consulting work with nursing programs. In other words, there won’t be an internal pushback for Golesh if that opportunity were to present itself. He’s proven at USF, who was 3-29 in the 3 years before his arrival, that he can rebuild a program. He’d make a ton of sense getting that opportunity at Arkansas.
2. Jon Sumrall, Tulane head coach
Lane Kiffin isn’t the only one who thinks that Sumrall could get an SEC job in the very near future. The former Troy head coach and current Tulane coach has long been considered the likely successor to Mark Stoops in Lexington, which could complicate a potential fit at Arkansas. Still, though. Sumrall is one of the top defensive minds in the sport, which is a big reason why he’s won at least 9 games in his first 3 seasons as a head coach. A 36-10 mark at a pair of Group of 5 programs might not sound like a can’t-miss candidate, but 7 of those losses came to Power Conference programs.
Sumrall is the real deal, and a 43-year-old Texas native would be an easy sell to the Arkansas faithful. If he’s not hired at a place like Arkansas, one could assume the Hogs will soon have regular visits with whatever SEC team he’s coaching.
3. Ryan Silverfield, Memphis head coach
Um, do I need to talk any Arkansas fans into this? All the guy did was pull off the biggest FBS comeback of the season with 290 rushing yards against the Arkansas defense. And while that was a small sample size, all Silverfield has done at Memphis the last decade is work his way up from an offensive line coach into an ideal Mike Norvell replacement. Memphis is 5-0, having already won the Power Conference game on its schedule — sorry for the reminder — so there could be a realistic shot at getting the Group of 5 spot for the Playoff. Would that complicate a potential hire? Possibly.
But Silverfield, like Pittman, has an offensive line background that would play well at Arkansas. He’s a bit unique in that he didn’t play college football, and perhaps there would be some skepticism about someone who has been at the same place for the last 10 seasons. Whatever the case, Silverfield looks like he’s about to lead the Tigers to their 3rd consecutive season with double-digit wins. You can do a whole lot worse than the guy who beat you at your own game.
4. GJ Kinne, Texas State head coach
As great as it is that Texas State is leaving the Sun Belt for the Pac-12, the lure of an SEC job could be too much for someone like Kinne to turn down. His explosive offenses have made the 36-year-old coach a popular rising name in the profession, and it helps that he’s now in Year 4 as a head coach (1 at Incarnate Word, 3 at Texas State). Like with Golesh, he spent time at UCF, but did so as Gus Malzahn’s OC before getting the Incarnate Word job and instantly turning it into an offensive juggernaut.
The only knock on Kinne is that he was on the Morris era staff, though just as an analyst. Perhaps he learned exactly what he shouldn’t do because he turned a Texas State offense that finished outside the top 100 in scoring into a top-11 unit in Years 2 and 3. It wouldn’t be a surprise if his run-and-gun offense got an opportunity at a bigger job in 2026. The only downside might be that Oklahoma State could make more sense for Kinne.
5. Jeff Traylor, UTSA head coach
Sensing a theme here? Yes, there are all Group of 5 head coaches who have done impressive things at that level. That includes Traylor, who has 5 consecutive winning seasons at UTSA. Mind you, that came after Traylor spent 2 years on that aforementioned Morris staff as the running backs coach at Arkansas. Make of that what you will. If that’s considered a deal-breaker, it would ignore that when he’s been running his own program, he’s racked up a ton of wins, even after UTSA transitioned to the AAC.
It would make sense if Arkansas hired someone with Texas roots like Traylor. Given the recruiting history, Traylor could bring that to the table having spent time at both Texas and SMU. He wouldn’t be the splashiest of hires compared to some of the other more popular Group of 5 names listed here because he’s 57 — Pittman was 58 when he was hired — so that might not be considered a slam dunk. But if Arkansas is seeking experience, getting someone with 3 decades of it almost exclusively in the Lone Star State would make him an intriguing candidate.
Connor O'Gara is the senior national columnist for Saturday Down South. He's a member of the Football Writers Association of America. After spending his entire life living in B1G country, he moved to the South in 2015.
