Urban Meyer knows a thing or two about what makes a great college football coach.
The 62-year-old College Football Hall of Fame inductee won three national championships during his nearly two-decade career, two of which came while he was roaming the sidelines at the University of Florida.
His ties to Gainesville made him a trusted voice in the Gators’ latest coaching search, and coaching searches have been frequent occurrences since he exited stage left in December 2010.
With Meyer’s help, Florida selected Jon Sumrall, whose first year is off to a roaring start thanks to two top-10 wins (Ole Miss and Texas) before he’s even had a chance to coach a full season.
Seven games into his tenure, Meyer has been blown away by Sumrall, and joined Dan Dakich on his show, “Don’t @ Me,” to discuss how he had a small part in helping usher the new Gator to The Swamp this past fall.
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“I don’t like him, I love the guy,” Meyer said with the same smile a proud older sibling would wear when talking about his younger brother’s accomplishments.
“I never met him until this year, I was involved in the coaching search. They asked me to kind of vet, and one phone call, I hung up the phone and I called a guy on the board of trustees and I said, ‘you found your guy, man.'”
As I mentioned before, Meyer knows what a good coach looks like.
Outside of his accomplishments, Meyer’s “coaching tree” looks as impressive as anyone’s not named “Saban.”
Just a few of Urban’s notable assistant coaches over the years include Ryan Day, Dan Mullen, Brian Hartline, Charlie Strong, Steve Addazio, Luke Fickell, and Mike Vrabel, among others.
So, when Urban Meyer hops on the phone and says “you found your guy,” chances are he’s onto something.
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“This guy doesn’t b—h… you ever hear him bitch about the NIL? You ever hear him b—h about the transfer portal,” Meyer asked rhetorically. “No, he loves the game. He loves his players.”
Meyer also lauds Sumrall for how tough he is on his players while still showing them love.
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“I love when he says, ‘yeah, we suck, we just suck less today and we beat Texas.’ I mean how cool is that?”
A big part of why Meyer has been so drawn to the 43-year-old Gators coach is the fact that he sees a lot of his younger self in Sumrall, too.
He brings up their Bloody Tuesday practices and mentions that the second in command is Rusty Whitt, Florida’s head strength coach.
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“The number two in charge is their strength coach, just like us,” Meyer recalls. “I believe he’s a Green Beret who runs the strength program, and he’s the culture.”
It’s early, and a lot of things can still change, but Sumrall is doing his best to make Meyer look like a genius since the moment he hung up that phone 11 months ago.