Mike Norvell's monstrous buyout bought him more than his fair share of leash at Florida State. But it turns out that the indignity of losing by two scores at home to a floundering Clemson team was the straw that broke the camel's back: On Sunday, the school announced that Norvell was officially out as Seminoles head coach, bringing to an end a turbulent six-plus-year tenure that peaked with a near-College Football Playoff bid in 2023 before quickly crumbling.
Now comes the business of finding his successor. It's hard to overstate the stakes here, given FSU's tenuous place in the sport's hierarchy; behind on money and on the outside looking in on the Big Ten and SEC after years of behind-the-scenes turmoil (here's your reminder that this school doesn't even have a permanent athletic director in place right now), one more botched hire could spell doom for a program with tons of history behind it.
So you can forget about your Jimbo Fisher fan fic, or a feel-good legacy hire like Seminole alum Manny Diaz. Florida State needs something sturdier, either a head coach with proven program-building success in the portal era or an up-and-coming coordinator with energy to burn. The good news is there are plenty of candidates out there in this cycle, so let's dive in.
Honorable mentions: Matt Entz, Fresno State HC; Blake Baker, LSU DC; Rhett Lashlee, SMU HC; Manny Diaz, Duke HC; Mike Shanahan, Indiana OC
Bob Chesney, UCLA HC
Any list has to start with Chesney, and not just because he has UCLA undefeated in his first year out west. He's won everywhere he's been, from Holy Cross to James Madison to Westwood, and he's an East Coast guy to boot. Sure, it would be abrupt to bail on the Bruins after just one season, especially considering that he'd be leaving the Big Ten for the ACC. That said, UCLA isn't exactly on stable footing either right now, and a return to a more geographically familiar location — with, at least ostensibly, more resources at its disposal — might be appealing.
Jake Dickert, Wake Forest HC
Washington State and Wake Forest were two of the most difficult power-conference jobs in the country when Dickert took them, and yet he's managed to not just survive but thrive in both. After winning eight games in Pullman, he left for Winston-Salem, where he has the Demon Deacons all the way up at No. 14 in the latest AP poll and looking like real College Football Playoff contenders. The man is a builder, pure and simple, and if he can do it with these sorts of budgets, why couldn't he do it in Tallahassee?
Will Stein, Kentucky HC
A Louisville native, it might be hard to pry Stein away from his home state; he just got there, after all, and the arrow is pointed straight up for the Wildcats right now. Plus, again, SEC money is different than ACC money. Florida State has to at least make him say no, though, He's too good a coach, with a track record of great offense dating back to both Oregon and UTSA before he got to Lexington. He's young, he's sharp, he's a dynamic recruiter and his first portal class at Kentucky proves he knows what he's doing with the funds he has.
Kenny Dillingham, Arizona State HC
Before he was the head coach in Tempe, Dillingham spent two seasons as offensive coordinator at Florida State from 2020-21. Granted, those two seasons did not go particularly well (though the offense was not the primary problem), but his overall track record suggests a creative mind who knows how to do more with less. He put up video-game numbers with Bo Nix at quarterback back when Nix's stock was at an all-time low, and he got Arizona State to within an eyelash of the CFP semifinals. It hasn't been smooth sailing for the Sun Devils since that magical run, but he knows what he's doing as a coach and he's an avid fundraiser.
Willie Fritz, Houston HC
Fritz left Tulane in his mid-60s to finally give himself a real shot at contending for a national title, and while he's quickly rebuilt a Houston program that was a mess when he arrived, he's undoubtedly got limited resources at his disposal right now. Florida State could fix that, improving his standing while giving him access to all the talent he could want. And like with Chesney, literally all Fritz does, wherever he is, is win. Sure, he's old, and he might not be flashy, but he has as high a floor as just about anyone in the country.
Eli Drinkwitz, Missouri HC
Drinkwitz is not the most likable guy, yet all he does is win — 12 wins in his lone season at App State, and 35-12 in his last four years at a Missouri job that isn't particularly easy in the crowded SEC middle class. He's reloaded multiple times in Columbia, too, often through shrewd portal management, so you know he has the ability to identify talent and allocate resources. Would it be a strange cultural fit? Maybe. And we've yet to see Drink really break through that glass ceiling. But he's overachieved his station an awful lot.
Charles Huff, Memphis HC
Huff has hopped around quite a bit over the last few years, from Marshall to Southern Miss to Memphis, but he's won at all of those stops. He's now 7-2 in year one at Memphis, with a roster that is almost entirely portalled. He's even got Power 4 and Nick Saban experience, for those who care about such things, with major successes as a recruiter at Penn State and Alabama. A Maryland native and Hampton grad, he knows the mid-Atlantic region well, and he should have no trouble recruiting Florida.
Glenn Schumann, Georgia DC
This would be the Kirby Smart/Dan Lanning route, as Schumann has sat at the master's right hand in Athens for nearly a decade now. He's been the Dawgs' sole DC for the last three years, and his 2026 unit might be his finest yet. The question marks are obvious: He's never been a head coach before at any level, and we have no idea how he'd do outside of the Smart ecosystem. He's learned from the best, though, and we were asking the same things about Lanning not too long ago.
Bryant Haines, Indiana DC
Another potential DC route: Haines has been by Curt Cignetti's side going back several stops now, and might be the single biggest non-Cig reason for Indiana's ascent to the top of the sport. All he does is produce excellent, exotic defenses, often from spare parts. Again, like with Schumann, we don't know how he'd approach building his own program. But copying the Cignetti blueprint seems pretty sound.
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