College football first-year coach grades: Bill Belichick gets 'D' after rough season at North Carolina

The biggest hire of the coaching carousel didn't work out nearly as well as expected. 

It was a relatively quiet coaching carousel a year ago, at least at the Power Four level where only six programs made changes leading into the 2025 season. There wasn't a big marquee opening the way there was the year prior (Alabama, Michigan) or the following year (LSU, Florida, Penn State and Michigan). Instead, it was North Carolina that made the splash of the cycle when it lured eight-time Super Bowl champion Bill Belichick to Chapel Hill. 

Unfortunately for UNC, Belichick and his team made more waves off the field than it did on it. It was another much less heralded hire in North Carolina that fared considerably better. 

With the 2025 season officially in the books now, here is the full list of grades on the Year 1 performances of every first-year Power Four head coach. 

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Carter Bahns

North Carolina

Bill Belichick: D

No hire was more hyped and failed worse than Bill Belichick in 2025. There was so much buzz leading up to the Tar Heels' season debut which got prime-time national TV coverage and had program celebrities Michael Jordan and Lawrence Taylor in attendance. UNC got crushed, 48-14, and it set the tone for what was to come. A UNC team that was always going to have talent deficiencies still looked like less than the sum of its parts. The only team UNC beat that finished with a winning record was FCS Richmond. For all the offseason drama UNC had to withstand because of Belichick, the 2025 results had to be hard to swallow. Record: 4-8

Purdue

Barry Odom: D

Barry Odom inherited a tough situation and did little to improve upon it. Like his predecessor, Ryan Walters in 2024, Odom went winless in Big Ten conference play. Purdue's lone wins came against FCS Southern Illinois and a 4-8 Ball State team. Odom has proven himself as a solid coach and the Boilermakers seemed to play hard for him, but it was a disappointing debut nonetheless. Record: 2-10

Stanford

Frank Reich: C-

In what was always going to be a one-year interim period, Frank Reich wasn't able to turn around a slipping Stanford program. The Florida State win was a highlight, but the Cardinal were mostly hapless in the ACC this season. A season-opening loss to Hawaii got the Reich experiment off to a bad start, and Stanford lost six games by 15 or more points. Record: 4-8

UCF 

Scott Frost: C+

In the return of Scott Frost, the first-year coach was able to improve UCF's record by one win but still missed a bowl appearance. Frost got off to a hot start, winning his first three games but finished with the thud of losing four of his last five. UCF won only two of its nine Big 12 conference games, highlighting the steep climb to come for Frost to return the program to its 2017 high of a perfect 13-0 record. Record: 5-7

Wake Forest 

Jake Dickert: A

There were questions about fit as Jake Dickert had spent his entire career out West, but he quickly showed why AD John Currie believed he could win in Winston Salem. Dickert was the best hire of the cycle, taking over where Dave Clawson left off and guiding the Demon Deacons to wins over SMU, Virginia and North Carolina. It was only the fourth time in school history it recorded nine or more wins, quite the accomplishment for a first-year coach. The future looks bright at Wake Forest under Dickert. Record: 9-4

West Virginia

Rich Rodriguez: C-

Rich Rodriguez learned that the reality of returning home is more challenging than the dream of it. In a much-publicized return to the school where he won 60 games in seven seasons the first time around, Rodriguez's Mountaineers 2.0 looked overwhelmed and a long way away from truly competing in the Big 12. An anemic WVU offense ranked No. 110 in scoring offense and No. 96 in total offense. If there's any solace for WVU fans, Rodriguez only won three games in his first season in Morgantown back in 2001 and rebounded the following year with nine wins. With how much the game has changed, though, it'll be much more challenging to have that big a turnaround in 2026. Record: 4-8