Tom Herman
Followed Willie Taggart. Tom Herman held Florida Atlantic at Regional Program II for 2 seasons.
Career arc
His real stature score, season by season, across every program he’s coached — so a stretch that stays in one tier the whole way can still climb or sink on the line, not just flatten out. Node color marks the tier reached. Which program a stretch belongs to is carried by the shaded lane behind it.
Reached Power Program in his 3rd career season — faster than 46% of the 395 FBS coaches who have ever reached Power Program (rank #194 of 395 by seasons-to-arrival).
Style position and drift
Where each stint’s offense sat between run-first and pass-first, and how far it moved from one season to the next. The band is that stint’s real season-to-season range, not a fixed-width box.
Season-to-season pass-rate range for all 258 FBS coaching stints with at least three covered seasons, 2014–2025.
The big-game ledger
How he does in the games that matter most — rivalry record, performance broken out by real opponent tier, one-score games, and his toughest historical matchup.
4–5 against his rivals. Just 1–4 against Lincoln Riley.
His own effect, isolated
A statistical estimate of this coach’s contribution to team performance, separated from that season’s roster talent, returning production, and his coordinators — pooled across his whole head-coaching career.
Model fit as of 2026-09-04.
Coaching career
3rd-best Florida Atlantic tenure of 9 by the numbers.
Performs about as expected for his recruiting talent on offense and underperforms his recruiting talent on defense.
Followed Willie Taggart (2020–2022) · succeeded by Zach Kittley (2025–2026).
| Season | 2023 | 2024 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | |||
| Record | 4–8 | 1–1 | |
| Postseason | — | — | |
| Recruiting rank | #82 | #79 | |
| Style — pass rate | |||
| Pass rate | 52.8 | 43.4 | |
| Coordinators | |||
| OC | Charlie Frye | Charlie Frye | |
| DC | Brandon Harris / Roc Bellantoni | Brandon Harris / Roc Bellantoni | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | |||
| Offense | 41 | 45 | |
| Defense | 43 | 24 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script (2021+ only) | |||
| 1st-down pass% | 46.1 | 38.4 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 49.4 | 40.7 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 53.1 | 45.0 | |
A typical amount of portal roster-building.
Brings in smaller-than-position-typical players than most.
Recruits older, more experienced transfers than most.
1 player-season honored (All-America / national award): LaJohntay Wester (2023)
9th-best Texas tenure of 12 by the numbers.
Performs about as expected for his recruiting talent, on both sides of the ball.
Followed Charlie Strong (2014–2016) · succeeded by Steve Sarkisian (2021–2026).
| Season | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | |||||
| Record | 7–6 | 10–4 | 8–5 | 7–3 | |
| Postseason | W bowl | W bowl | W CFP | W bowl | |
| Recruiting rank | #25 | #3 | #3 | #9 | |
| Style — pass rate | |||||
| Pass rate | 49.6 | 45.5 | 49.5 | 48.4 | |
| Coordinators | |||||
| OC | Tim Beck | Herb Hand / Tim Beck | Herb Hand / Tim Beck | Herb Hand / Mike Yurcich | |
| DC | Todd Orlando | Todd Orlando | Todd Orlando / Craig Naivar | Chris Ash / Coleman Hutzler | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | |||||
| Offense | 9 | 78 | 91 | 78 | |
| Defense | 94 | 50 | 53 | 63 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script (2021+ only) | |||||
| 1st-down pass% | 49.7 | 47.2 | 50.0 | 45.8 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 43.4 | 38.5 | 50.0 | 50.4 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 40.7 | 30.4 | 37.5 | 29.0 | |
15 NFL Draft picks: D'Onta Foreman (2017), Connor Williams (2018), Malik Jefferson (2018), Michael Dickson (2018), DeShon Elliott (2018), Charles Omenihu (2019), Kris Boyd (2019), Brandon Jones (2020) + 7 more
1 player-season honored (All-America / national award): Joseph Ossai (2020)
4th-best Houston tenure of 16 by the numbers.
Performs about as expected for his recruiting talent on offense and outperforms his recruiting talent on defense.
Followed Tony Levine (2012–2014).
| Season | 2015 | 2016 | Trend |
|---|---|---|---|
| Record & result | |||
| Record | 13–1 | 9–3 | |
| Postseason | W CFP | L bowl | |
| Recruiting rank | #89 | #36 | |
| Style — pass rate | |||
| Pass rate | 39.2 | 48.2 | |
| Coordinators | |||
| OC | Major Applewhite | Major Applewhite | |
| DC | Todd Orlando | Todd Orlando | |
| Outcome — opponent-adjusted efficiency percentile | |||
| Offense | 82 | 31 | |
| Defense | 59 | 87 | |
| Tendencies — play-by-play, neutral script (2021+ only) | |||
| 1st-down pass% | 36.0 | 49.0 | |
| Red-zone pass% | 29.4 | 33.3 | |
| 4th-down go%opp. territory | 41.9 | 41.9 | |
6 NFL Draft picks: William Jackson III (2016), Elandon Roberts (2016), Demarcus Ayers (2016), Tyus Bowser (2017), Howard Wilson (2017), Brandon Wilson (2017)