As he returns to the NFL, Jim Harbaugh leaves college football with a legacy of success
Hoisting the College Football Playoff trophy after Michigan’s first outright national championship in 75 years is the most memorable image in Jim Harbaugh’s college coaching career. Mentioning how he can “sit at the big person’s table now” with his championship-winning father and brother, all that was missing from his postgame press conference following the Wolverines’ win against Washington earlier this month was a wall-to-wall “mission accomplished” banner. As he heads back to the NFL, this indelible moment should end up as his last in the college game. “That’ll check the biggest box,” he said. Read more at:
According to a source close to the negotiations, Harbaugh decided on Wednesday to take over as head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers, USA TODAY Sports has learned. Since they weren’t allowed to talk about the deal, the speaker only agreed to remain anonymous. Satisfied with his goal of returning a national championship to Ann Arbor, he was satisfied with his performance as a college coach. This was an inevitable time for Harbaugh to make a second Super Bowl run after his previous one with the San Francisco 49ers, given the additional threat of additional sanctions due to this season’s sign-stealing scandal and his skyrocketing stock.
Following his huge victories at Stanford and with the Wolverines, he leaves behind a complex, distinctive, underappreciated legacy that will undoubtedly earn him a spot in the College Football Hall of Fame. Like Harbaugh, his college career was flawless in its imperfection, much like the sport in general. During this historic season, Harbaugh was suspended for six games due to two different infractions. The first stemmed from an NCAA violation that happened during the COVID-19 season. After that year, he revamped his program and achieved unprecedented success; prior to that, though, he was facing unstable employment and a severely damaged reputation.
Despite this, the two things that will stick in the memory of Harbaugh’s college career the most are his three distinct rebuilding projects, none more spectacular than the last, and the fact that he was one of the very few coaches whose appointment would ensure success. When he joined Stanford in 2007, the team had just one victory and was at the bottom of the conference standings. He pulled off one of the biggest upsets in Bowl Subdivision history against Southern California during his rookie season. In 2009, he led Stanford to the postseason. The following season, he achieved a program record 12 wins, including an Orange Bowl victory.
Before Harbaugh was hired as head coach of the San Francisco 49ers following that Orange Bowl victory, there was and is little question that he had the Cardinals on track to contend for and win a national championship. The evidence can be found in his remnants: After taking over as head coach in 2011, David Shaw built on the foundation laid by Harbaugh to lead Stanford to its greatest run in school history over the course of the next eight seasons, going 82-26. Harbaugh created the foundation for a powerhouse out of nothing.
Stung by the failed hires of Rich Rodriguez and Brady Hoke, Harbaugh was lured back to a Michigan program in 2015 after four seasons in the NFL. The program had been out of commission for seven years. Being the first Michigan coach to do so in the contemporary era, he won 10 games in each of his first two seasons. A recurrent theme that once threatened to overshadow Harbaugh’s tenure occurred in 2016 and 2018, when he led the Wolverines into Columbus to play rival Ohio State with a chance to play for the Big Ten championship and a playoff berth. By the time 2021 rolled around, his teams had a combined record of 3-8 against the Buckeyes and Michigan State.
The best three-year run in the history of the current program came after the Wolverines’ poorest point during the COVID year, when they lost four of their six games. Michigan made history by becoming the first program to win three straight Big Ten titles, defeat the Buckeyes three times in a row for the first time since 1995–1997, making three consecutive playoff appearances, and finishing in the top five three times in a row—another first in the poll era.
The Wolverines, who were the first program in Big Ten history to win an unshared national championship since Minnesota in 1960, overtook Ohio State as the league’s dominant team during this stretch, sending the rival into a deep state of introspection. As expected, Michigan topped the Big Ten and the FBS after Harbaugh returned to his alma mater. The fact that it took him nine seasons to get there is not a reflection on his resume but rather an indication of a mid-career reinvention; Harbaugh modified his coaching staff, his program, and his approach to himself, reducing the emphasis on “more is more” that characterized his early seasons.
Along with Dabo Swinney of Clemson, Kirby Smart of Georgia, and Mack Brown of North Carolina, Harbaugh was one of only four active FBS head coaches to have won a national championship at the time of his departure for Los Angeles.
NFL head coaches have a much shorter shelf life than their college counterparts. Harbaugh had the second-highest winning percentage in 49ers history, but he had a falling out with ownership and was fired after just four seasons. With the Chargers, 60-year-old Harbaugh might be able to win a Super Bowl and still have the stamina to try for a national championship one more time.
To what location would he go? If the chance arises, he might go back to Michigan, where he would undoubtedly be greeted with open arms. No way could he take a job in the Big Ten. The SEC and his desire to face Paul Finebaum head-on could tempt him. Harbaugh could always carry on his father’s legacy and dominate Western Kentucky, where he played in the NFL for eight years and served as an unpaid assistant. Those scenarios don’t seem plausible at all. That is the last item on Harbaugh’s checklist—he won at Michigan. His college career’s highs and lows will be recorded in history. Still, Harbaugh will always be remembered as one of the greatest of his generation.
