ESPN College Football Senior writer and one of the most respected journalists in all of football Pete Thamel has reported that Dino Babers will be dismissed from his duties as Syracuse head coach later today.
This news comes after Syracuse’s 31-22 loss to Georgia Tech last night. The Orange are in the midst of a skid which includes losing five of their last six games. Last year, SU also lost five of its last six regular season games before dropping the bowl game.
Recruitment has continued to struggle under Babers. The 2022 class was the worst in all of the power-five and the 2023 class isn’t much better. Penalties were once again a major issue for Babers this season. The Orange are the 13th most penalized team in the country.
While this move shouldn’t be surprising considering the number of calls from the fanbase, it still is considering Syracuse still has a chance to make a bowl game. In his summer press conference, John Wildhack stated that Babers has multiple years left on his contract and that the goal is to be good enough to play in a 13th game.
But the time was now. Wildhack had to make the move to let his head football coach go. Seven collapses in eight seasons is just simply unacceptable at this level and just one great season in eight years doesn’t cut it.
Dino Babers was a good person, a great quote, and cared about “the right way.” But he also had only 2 winning seasons in 8 years, went 0-for-November four times, and never had an offensive player drafted to the NFL. Syracuse gave him more than enough time. They have to pivot.
— Damon Amendolara (@DamonAmendo) November 19, 2023
I do wish Dino luck, he seems like a great dude. But eight years is long enough to make a determination and he just wasn’t getting it done. He got more leeway than any coach since Pasqualoni so it’s not like he wasn’t given ample opportunity.
— OG 🍊 (@OttosGrove) November 19, 2023
In the past eight months, John Wildhack has had to replace both his head football and head basketball coach. Who the athletic director decides to replace Babers with is a loaded question. The precedent set at this university has been to hire in-house. Felisha Legette-Jack, Adrian Autry and Lynn Farquhar are the last three coaches to be hired at SU and all either played or coached in the 315 at some point in their careers.
It’s a tumultuous time in the 315 right now and it’ll be very interesting to see now just who the interim head coach is but also what happens in the final game of the season. If there is one thing to know about Babers it’s that his players always seemed to love him. The Orange still have a shot to make a bowl game for the second straight year for the first time since 2012-13.
