He’s the winningest coach in program history, defined in some ways by viral press conferences and a stubborn streak.
He’s only ever been a head coach at one program which led to incredible highs that may never be matched again. His defiant personality is part superpower, part kryptonite. Over time, frustration mounted over his refusal to change his ways. Akin to the famous Ernest Hemingway quote, his program started to crumble gradually, then suddenly.
The man above is Mike Gundy.
The man above is also Dabo Swinney.
Gundy, Oklahoma State’s head coach for 21 seasons was fired Tuesday amidst a disappointing 1-2 start to the 2025 season.
Swinney, Clemson’s head coach for the last 18 seasons, is currently 1-3 this year after a loss to Syracuse last weekend. Swinney isn’t in danger of being fired this season like Gundy — a whopping $60 million buyout certainly helps job security — but long-term he could find a similar fate to the mulleted former Oklahoma State coach if he doesn’t change his ways.
There are plenty of differences between the former Oklahoma State quarterback and the Alabama walk-on receiver, but the similarities are striking. These are two men who have been loyal to one program their entire head coaching careers and were beloved by fans for large swaths of that time. There were media darlings for a stretch, too, until eventually becoming punchlines.
Gundy never won quite to the level Swinney has at Clemson with his two national championships, though he did come awfully close back in the BCS era when the Cowboys finished No. 3 in 2011. Gundy had only two losing seasons in Stillwater and took the program to never-experienced-before highs. There was even a top-10 finish just four years ago when Oklahoma State beat Notre Dame in the Sugar Bowl and finished the season ranked No. 7.
Mike Gundy took Oklahoma State from afterthought to contender, but he also sowed the seeds to its unraveling
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As college football rapidly changed, however, Gundy refused to change with it. He resisted NIL only to complain about it this season ahead of a game against Oregon when it was far too late to save the sinking ship. He was too loyal to a staff that wasn’t cutting it anymore; wholesale changes this season were too little, too late. He relied too much on previous success as the reason to keep doing what he was doing, ignoring the fact that what got him here wasn’t going to get him there.
And yet for all Gundy’s flaws at the end, it’ll be near impossible for Oklahoma State to find someone who can match the highs of his tenure in its next head coach.
You could say almost all of those things apply to Dabo, too. He famously said he may quit college football if players started getting paid, as they eventually did in 2021 with NIL. He has eschewed utilizing the transfer portal as rivals added impactful players and took advantage of the new era of player movement, only finally adding a high-level transfer this season with Will Heldt. He believes in doing things his way, even when everyone around him is changing with the times.
Dabo is, in many ways, the American dream. His childhood, which has been much written about, was challenging, to say the least. He had an alcoholic father and his family struggled financially so badly at one point that he and his mother, Carol, not only had to share a room but a bed in college because they couldn’t afford to do anything else. When that guy from Pelham, Alabama goes on to make more than $10 million a year and win two national championships, it’s understandable why he has so much self-belief in what he’s doing is right when so many outsiders are telling him he’s wrong. He’s been blessed beyond his wildest dreams.
Dabo so thoroughly believes in his culture that he loves to cultivate in-house talent and promote from within. When everything is working, as it did so magnificently in the mid-2010s, it’s a smart strategy to keep the momentum going. But when the organization hits a pothole like it has this season, and several seasons prior, it can be helpful to have different perspectives to find solutions. His staff is littered with former players and coaches who have only ever been at Clemson and don’t know any other way of succeeding in college football. Swinney raised the bar of expectations at Clemson, even coming up with the slogan “Best is the standard,” but now ruffles under the weight of his own success.
“If they want me gone, they’re tired of winning, they can send me on their way because that’s all we’ve done is win,” Swinney said after a loss to Georgia Tech.
It’s hard when you have done so much for a program and feel like you aren’t given enough grace and time to work through the challenges. Gundy and Swinney have been extremely loyal to one place, and they’ve been rewarded with millions of dollars along the way for their successes. They both deserve and will likely get statues at Oklahoma State and Clemson one day. But as Gundy learned the hard way Tuesday, there are limits to that loyalty and programs won’t hesitate to drop millions of dollars to make you go away, too, if there’s enough unrest within the booster and fan ranks.
The good news for Swinney is he has far more talent on his Clemson roster than Gundy did at the end of his Oklahoma State run. The bad news is it makes the 1-3 start to a season that came with national title aspirations all the more confounding. NFL scouts love this roster, which should feature multiple future first-round picks, and believe there’s more than enough talent for the Tigers to be better than what they’ve shown this season. The home loss to LSU was disappointing yet understandable; the subsequent losses to Georgia Tech and Syracuse boggle the mind.
“It’s a frustrating thing because we are a talented football team,” Swinney said. “We have underachieved, and that falls on me. I feel like I let a lot of people down, especially these seniors, but we’ve all got a job, and there’s accountability for all of us.”
Dabo Swinney, Clemson plummet to new lows as upset loss to Syracuse continues disaster start to season
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Is the coaching staff not good enough? Are the players not being properly prepared and developed ahead of gamedays? Is Swinney’s message not resonating the way it once did?
These are all real questions Swinney needs to look in the mirror and try to answer about his downward program.
If not, all he needs to do is look toward Stillwater to see what can happen to a once-beloved coach who stubbornly refused to change with the times.
