Coaching matters in football more than any other sport. Coaching matters even more in college football as you can outscheme your opponents on a weekly basis. We are going to rank the top five coaches in college football from week to week in our Coach of the Year Rankings.

#1 Gus Malzahn, Auburn Tigers

It’s trendy to take the coaches with the least amount of talent who are currently winning. This list will reflect some of that. Here’s a legitimate question- if you had to put your life on one college football game and you could pick one guy to coach it, who’s it going to be? For this writer, the answer is simply Gus Malzahn. Malzahn does more with less and when he has more, he doesn’t lose.

#2 Rich Rodriguez, Arizona Wildcats

Rich Rod was labeled a lot of things when he left Michigan, and none of them were good. Every head coach gets fired at some point. It shouldn’t stay with a coach forever and even Michigan fans should appreciate the job he’s doing at Arizona. Rodriguez has been winning with three-star athletes for years and now he’s doing it in one of the toughest conferences in America- with similar athletes. Put the stigma aside and look at the job he’s doing, it’s one of the best in the country.

#3 Gary Patterson, TCU

Did TCU’s victory over Oklahoma vault Patterson onto this list? Absolutely. The truth is that Gary Patterson has been doing more with less for a long time and if he runs the table, he will win Coach of the Year. His team will also be in the playoff.

#4 Art Briles, Baylor

Art Briles has built the Baylor program and he’s one of the very best coaches in the nation. Briles likely won’t win the award because his team has expectations now following last season’s Big 12 title. Just think for a moment and appreciate the fact that the Baylor football program has expectations.

#5 Jimbo Fisher, FSU

Jimbo is automatically discounted from most coaching awards due to all the talent the Seminoles have on the roster. Again, who recruited all that talent? Fisher has been one of the elite offensive coaches in football, even if it isn’t recognized. He will likely have his third consecutive first-round NFL quarterback. Some of that has to be player development, right? The ‘Noles could win every game by record margins and set a new scoring mark and Jimbo still won’t get recognized. Oh wait, that happened last year.