Win Percentages

Posted onOctober 30, 2011 - 9:17 pm by Admin | 0 Comments

When discussing Jerry Kill and his struggles as Gopher head coach, most Gopher fans will invoke the names of Barry Alvarez and Kirk Ferentz as justification for not judging Kill for the product on the field for at least 4 seasons.  The argument is that both coaches won only a single game in their first season as head coach and went on to build nationally prominent programs, in Wisconsin’s case after a long stretch of mediocrity.

As we all know anecdotal evidence is by definition a contradiction in terms, so if we look at the overall data for coaches with 1 or fewer wins over a significant sample size how often does first year performance predict future success?  Especially in extreme cases like Alvarez and Ferentz.Let’s start by looking at the performance of FBS coaches who started their career with 1 or fewer wins to begin their career at a school:

The overall numbers don’t look good.  As we can see only 9 coaching stints, and 8 coaches total) of the 109 coaching stints measured in this sample ended up with a winning percentage of .500 or better.  So odds are if your coach starts slow out of the gates you won’t get one of those decent coaches and will instead pull from a pool similar to those outside the Top 9 in this sample.

Outside of the top 9 you end up with a .312 winning percentage.

If Kirk Ferentz / Barry Alvarez is the goal and you’re looking for a coach clearing the .600 mark only 6 coaches in this sample achieved that with half of those being back in the 70s.

Let’s extend this out further and look at how first year wins project to the all time winning percentage for a coach at a given school across all first year win totals:

That’s a fairly strong trend.  If your coach wins 3 or fewer games in his first three seasons his odds of long term success are not very good.  There are outliers like Alvarez and Ferentz, but generally coaches with good all time records start their careers respectably.

Statistically speaking if your coach begins his stay at your school with 1 or fewer wins you’re much more likely to end up with a Jim Hess than a Barry Alvarez.

  • Volleyball: Oct 30 - South Alabama   vs.   FIU
  • Volleyball: Oct 30 - ULM   vs.   Arkansas State
  • Volleyball: Oct 30 - Louisiana-Lafayette   vs.   UALR
  • Volleyball: Nov 01 - Florida Gulf Coast   vs.   Florida Atlantic
  • Volleyball: Nov 01 - South Alabama   vs.   Troy
  • Soccer: Nov 02 - Arkansas State   vs.   FIU
  • Soccer: Nov 02 - Western Kentucky   vs.   Middle Tennessee
  • Soccer: Nov 02 - Troy   vs.   North Texas
  • Soccer: Nov 02 - South Alabama   vs.   Denver
  • Soccer: Nov 03 - TBA   vs.   TBA
  • Soccer: Nov 03 - TBA   vs.   TBA
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - Florida Atlantic   vs.   Louisiana-Lafayette
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - UALR   vs.   Denver
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - FIU   vs.   ULM
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - Western Kentucky   vs.   South Alabama
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - Arkansas State   vs.   North Texas
  • Volleyball: Nov 04 - Middle Tennessee   vs.   Troy
  • Football: Nov 05 - FIU   vs.   Western Kentucky
  • Football: Nov 05 - Troy   vs.   Navy
  • Football: Nov 05 - ULM   vs.   Louisiana-Lafayette
  • Soccer: Nov 05 - TBA   vs.   TBA
  • Football: Nov 05 - Arkansas State   vs.   Florida Atlantic
  • Volleyball: Nov 05 - Western Kentucky   vs.   Troy
  • Volleyball: Nov 05 - Florida Atlantic   vs.   ULM
  • Football: Nov 05 - Middle Tennessee   vs.   Tennessee
  • Volleyball: Nov 06 - Arkansas State   vs.   Denver
  • Volleyball: Nov 06 - UALR   vs.   North Texas
  • Volleyball: Nov 06 - FIU   vs.   Louisiana-Lafayette
  • Volleyball: Nov 06 - Middle Tennessee   vs.   South Alabama
  • Volleyball: Nov 08 - Florida Gulf Coast   vs.   FIU

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