How 11 first-year coaches are navigating recruiting and the portal: Who’s making progress and who has work to do

After college football’s latest coaching carousel took place this winter, new coaches were tasked with filling out their staffs, navigating the first transfer portal window and the early signing period for recruits, all in the month of December.

Months later, the dust has settled and coaches moved onto the spring transfer window and the 2024 recruiting cycle, which as of Thursday has seen 113 prospects ranked in the ESPN 300 make commitments.

Last year, six teams with first-year coaches finished their first full recruiting cycles with top-10 classes, including Brent Venables at Oklahoma, Mario Cristobal at Miami, Marcus Freeman at Notre Dame and Lincoln Riley at USC.

This year’s coaching carousel featured 11 Power 5 teams with new coaches, including Deion Sanders taking over at Colorado, Matt Rhule replacing Scott Frost at Nebraska, Hugh Freeze becoming Auburn‘s next coach and Luke Fickell moving from Cincinnati to Wisconsin.

We break down how each new coach has fared on the recruiting trail, how they’ve navigated the transfer portal and what the short- and long-term situation is like as each coach looks to rebuild.

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Arizona State | Auburn | Cincinnati
Colorado | Georgia Tech | Louisville
Mississippi State | Nebraska
Purdue | Stanford | Wisconsin