By the numbers, Brian Kelly is one heck of a college football coach. Yes, he was just fired by the LSU Tigers, but it wasn’t because he couldn’t win games.
Kelly’s overall record as a head football coach at the DI level is 200-76. He took Notre Dame to the BCS Championship Game. At LSU, his overall record was 34-14. Winning hasn’t been a problem for Kelly. Winning when it really matters, though, was a problem.
College football is a “what have you done for me lately?” business, and Kelly found that out when he received his pink slip from LSU this past weekend.
Another coach who finds himself on the hot seat in 2025 is Dabo Swinney of the Clemson Tigers. LSU fired Kelly after a 5-3 start. Clemson is 3-4 this season with some really tough losses.
Swinney has won two championships for Clemson, but he’s under fire because of how his program has underperformed this season as well as over the past few. You can hear it in his voice as he discussed Kelly’s firing at LSU in a news conference on Tuesday.
“It’s a season of chaos, that’s for sure. It’s just the world we live in. It’s a crazy, crazy, crazy profession we signed up for,” Swinney said. “But, as I said last night, it’s hard. You’ve got a lot of really good football coaches that have won a lot of games, but they’re getting fired because they really haven’t won championships. And you’ve got others that want you fired even though you’ve won championships. So it’s kind of a crazy world. But it’s the world we live in. And, you know, it’s like a bloodsport.”
Swinney’s comments start around 23:12.
