Kirby Smart drops from top spot in ESPN’s ranking of college football coaches

No active college football coach has as many national championships as Georgia’s Kirby Smart.

Yet his two title runs in 2021 in 2022 are not enough to consider Smart the nation’s top head coach, according to ESPN rankings determined by a survey of its analysts.

Smart is No. 2 on the list after earning the top spot the past two years. Indiana’s Curt Cignetti vaulted over Smart after the former led Indiana to an unbeaten season and national championship.

Cignetti earned 94 points from the panel and five first-place votes. Smart was second with 90 points and four first-place votes.

“It takes a special coach to wrangle all the forces at a blue blood the way Kirby Smart has at Georgia while dominating the SEC,” ESPN’s Dave Wilson said. “If it were easy, everyone who has had one of those jobs could do it.”

Ohio State’s Ryan Day was third with 80 points, while Notre Dame’s Marcus Freeman was fourth, followed by Oregon’s Dan Lanning in fifth.

Perhaps the reason for Smart’s slight fall can be traced to the Bulldogs not winning a College Football Playoff game since the field expanded to 12 teams. In 2024, Georgia lost to Notre Dame. Ole Miss ended the Bulldogs’ 2025 season.

“Sure, consecutive CFP semifinal losses in the Sugar Bowl have been disappointing endings for the back-to-back SEC champs,” ESPN’s Max Olson said. “But I still think Smart’s track record of acquiring and developing blue-chip talent and consistently winning at the absolute highest level can’t be beat.”

While Indiana and Cignetti have recently ascended to the top of the sport, few teams have been able to maintain the level of consistency the Bulldogs have under Smart. Georgia has finished in the top 7 of the final Associated Press poll in each of the past nine years. The Bulldogs are the only team to make the College Football Playoff in four of the previous five seasons.