Among first-year coaches, Dan Lanning scores high grade while Mario Cristobal flops
Dan Lanning was one of the best first-year head coaches to come out of the 2022 class, while Mario Cristobal’s Year 1 at Miami can best be described as a flop.
That was the assessment from ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg, who handed out his end-of-the-year report cards for first-year head coaches this week. Lanning earned a B+ grade from Rittenberg after leading Oregon to a 10-3 record. Cristobal got one of the lowest grades of the 29 coaches, a D-
Here’s what Rittenberg wrote on Lanning:
Oregon is generally getting what it wants out of the Lanning hire, especially on the recruiting trail, which I’ll get to below. On the field, his results were mixed in Year 1. Oregon played very well following its season-opening loss to Georgia, winning eight straight games, most in dominant fashion. But the Ducks twice lost down the stretch, against rivals Washington and Oregon State, and missed the Pac-12 championship game despite having arguably the league’s most talented roster. There were clear positives, namely quarterback Bo Nix’s emergence, as he led an offense that eclipsed 40 points throughout the eight-game win streak. Nix showed his heroics in Oregon’s come-from-behind bowl win over North Carolina. But Oregon was positioned to do more down the stretch and fell a bit short.
And here’s what he wrote on Cristobal:
Miami’s hire of Cristobal and its unprecedented investment in the program were all about the long game. There are plenty of promising signs ahead for the U, but Cristobal’s debut fell well short of expectations. The Hurricanes averaged just 23.6 points and 128.1 rush yards per game, failing to eclipse 21 points in more than half of their games. There was no shortage of embarrassing moments for Cristobal’s team, especially on its home field, where the Canes fell 45-31 to Middle Tennessee, 45-21 to Duke and 45-3 to rival Florida State. Miami simply didn’t compete very well for Cristobal, dropping its last two games by a combined score of 82-26 to drop out of bowl contention. Cristobal didn’t inherit the best situation but still should have at least finished .500 in a very navigable ACC. Although Miami’s talent level isn’t where it will be in the future, several coaches mentioned Hurricanes players as being among the best in the ACC.
The grass was greener for Cristobal in Coral Gables. It’s understandable, Miami was home. But Lanning proved on the field in 2022 what he said in the press conference room: the grass is pretty green in Eugene as well.
Though the regular season closed out in rather disappointing fashion, Lanning still turned in an impressive first year. In winning 10 games, he matched Chip Kelly for the second-best debut season by a Duck head coach in program history.
Oregon ended with a 28-27 win in the Holiday Bowl, and though offensive coordinator Kenny Dillingham exited the program after the Oregon State game, Lanning has a culture already in place that made Bo Nix feel like another season in Eugene was the move to make.
In all likelihood, the Ducks will enter 2023 as a preseason top-10 team given what they showed in Lanning’s first season. There’s lots of work to be done to validate such a ranking given what the team loses this offseason, but Lanning’s debut season seemingly has the Ducks’ trajectory pointing upward.
The College Football Playoff, Rittenberg wrote, is a “realistic” goal in Year 2.