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The SEC coaching carousel is notorious for annually flinging off coaches and replacing them with new ones — even if some of those new ones are former ones.
In fact, seven teams will enter 2016 with a staff (head coach, offensive and defensive coordinators) in its first year together. Another four conference squads will be experiencing their sophomore seasons together.
The lineage of current SEC coaches and coordinators includes 43 coaches dating to 1973 and includes stops throughout the country from Alabama to Wyoming.
So who are the most loyal trios in the SEC? You might want to start your search in the Magnolia State.
Here is a look at the SEC staffs that have been together as a trio the longest, not necessarily in consecutive years.
MISSISSIPPI STATE
Coaches: Dan Mullen, John Hevesy and Billy Gonzales (OCs), and Peter Sirmon
Together: 12th season.
While it’s not quite a traditional coaching trio at Mississippi State, Dan Mullen and co-offensive coordinators John Hevesy and Billy Gonzales will mark their 12th year coaching side-by-side in 2016. The three men first worked together in 2001 and 2002 at Bowling Green before moving on to Utah for another two seasons. They broke into the SEC in 2005 with Florida and helped guide the Gators to a BCS title in 2008. Mullen and Hevesy used the title to take over at Mississippi State, where they were rejoined by Gonzales in Starkville for the 2013 campaign.
OLE MISS
Coaches: Hugh Freeze, Matt Luke (OC) and Dave Wommack (DC)
Together: Fifth season.
Hugh Freeze and his staff at Ole Miss have crisscrossed the SEC, particularly in 2006 when he, Matt Luke and Dave Wommack were at Ole Miss, Tennessee and South Carolina, respectively. Their paths didn’t intersect until 2011 at Arkansas State when Wommack agreed to be Freeze’s defensive coordinator in the coach’s final year.
Freeze brought Luke onboard to be his offensive coordinator in 2012 after accepting his position with the Rebels. Luke and Freeze first teamed up in 2005 at Ole Miss, when Freeze was an assistant athletics director and Luke coached tight ends and offensive line. The trio has been together in Oxford ever since, improving Ole Miss’ win total by one each year (10-3 in 2015). This season will be their fifth together, making them the second-longest coaching trio to stick together in the SEC.
KENTUCKY
Coaches: Mark Stoops, Eddie Gran (OC) and D.J. Eliot (DC)
Together: Fourth season.
Mark Stoops finally has his band back together with the addition of offensive coordinator Eddie Gran to the Kentucky staff for the 2016 season. Stoops and Gran, along with Wildcats defensive coordinator D.J. Eliot, first teamed up at Florida State under Jimbo Fisher between 2010 and 2012 — working to develop the likes of Christian Ponder, E.J. Manuel and Devonta Freeman.
Gran left the trio after Stoops was hired on at Kentucky in 2013, opting instead to become Cincinnati’s offensive coordinator for three seasons before finally reuniting with Stoops under the same title in Lexington.
Eliot, who received his first defensive coordinator role after following Stoops to Kentucky, first met the coach while they coached at Wyoming in 1998 — Stoops as a defensive backs coach and Eliot as a student assistant.
Stoops and Eliot also worked together for one season apiece at Houston and Miami. All told, between Florida State and Kentucky, Stoops, Gran and Eliot will experience their fourth season together on the sidelines.
ARKANSAS
Coaches: Bret Bielema, Dan Enos (OC) and Robb Smith (DC)
Together: Second season.
Bret Bielema and Robb Smith are quite comfortable with one another. The Arkansas head coach and his defensive coordinator will have been together for six years this season, splitting that time evenly between Fayetteville and Iowa (1999-2001).
Dan Enos joined the Razorbacks as offensive coordinator last season, completing the current trio. The former Central Michigan coach of five years is familiar with Bielema, however. Enos lost two of the three games in the late 2000s as running backs coach for Michigan State to the Bielema-piloted Wisconsin.
Last year they joined forces for one of the most prolific offensive seasons in Razorbacks history.
FLORIDA
Coaches: Jim McElwain, Doug Nussmeier (OC) and Geoff Collins (DC)
Together: Second season.
Jim McElwain and Doug Nussmeier went from running the Michigan State offense together between 2003 and 2005 to trying to one-up each other as quarterback coaches in the NFL a year later — when the former’s Oakland Raiders lost to the latter’s St. Louis Rams.
The Florida head coach might not have bragging rights over his current offensive coordinator, but at least he can hold a victory over the head of his defensive coordinator Geoff Collins. McElwain’s Alabama offense downed Collins’ Mississippi State defense when the two locked horns during the 2011 campaign.
All three coaches, though, didn’t come together on the Gators staff until last season. The result? Florida’s first outright SEC East title since 2009 when Tim Tebow was under center. They look to repeat that feat in their encore performance in the Swamp.
SOUTH CAROLINA
Coaches: Will Muschamp, Kurt Roper (OC) and Travaris Robinson (DC)
Together: Second season.
New South Carolina head coach Will Muschamp, along with coordinators Kurt Roper and Travaris Robinson have combined to coach for eight SEC schools.
Despite pin-balling throughout the conference, the 2016 season will be their first together in Columbia and second in the past three years as a collective brain trust — the other being in 2014 at Florida.
Where Robinson followed Muschamp to Auburn last season, Roper opted instead to join the Cleveland Browns. Apparently having had enough of the Johnny Manziel situation in Cleveland, Roper returned to head up Muschamp’s offense once again; this time for the Gamecocks.
Muschamp and Roper can trace their careers back to 1996 when they were both graduate assistants at Auburn (Muschamp) and Tennessee (Roper).
VANDERBILT
Coaches: Derek Mason and Andy Ludwig (OC)
Together: Second season.
Derek Mason and his second-year offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig can trace their roots to the Big Sky Conference — Mason as Weber State wide receiver coach and Ludwig guiding the Boise State quarterbacks. Ludwig got the best of Mason in their first matchup back in 1995. They also faced each other as opposing coaches at Idaho State (Mason) and Cal Poly in 1997, then again on a bigger stage in the Pac-10 during the 2010 season when Mason’s Stanford Cardinal defensive backs shut down Ludwig’s California Golden Bears offense. Apparently, the duo felt it was a better use of their talents to team up at Vanderbilt, where they enter their second season together.
Still learning their names …
The head coaches and coordinators at Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, LSU, Missouri, Tennessee and Texas A&M are in their first season as a group.
Chris Wuensch is a contributing writer for Saturday Down South. He covers South Carolina and Tennessee.
