Michigan made a late entry into the never-ending 2025 college football coaching carousel on Wednesday when it fired coach Sherrone Moore for cause.
The school said that Moore had been involved in an inappropriate relationship with a staffer. Hours after Michigan announced Moore’s firing, reports emerged that he had been detained by police in a nearby municipality and could potentially face charges regarding a Wednesday evening incident.
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With Biff Poggi installed as the team’s interim coach for the Citrus Bowl against Texas, the Wolverines are now searching for a coach. Here are five coaches who would make sense for Michigan.
Jedd Fisch, Washington
Fisch now has two seasons of experience as a head coach in the Big Ten after Washington’s move into the conference. He was an assistant for two seasons at Michigan in 2015 and 2016 as he worked as the team’s passing game coordinator before heading to UCLA as the offensive coordinator and then the Bruins’ interim coach at the end of the season.
Fisch isn’t the splashiest hire, but he has extensive NFL experience and worked as the New England Patriots QB coach during the 2020 season before taking the head coaching job at Arizona.
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The Wildcats went 1-11 in Fisch’s first season after taking over for Kevin Sumlin, but Arizona improved to 5-7 in 2022 and then went 10-3 in 2023 before he replaced Kalen DeBoer in Seattle. The Huskies are 14-11 in his two seasons in charge and were 8-4 in 2025.
Manny Diaz, Duke
Could Michigan be a second chance for Diaz at a traditional power? The former Miami coach is fresh off an ACC title win as his Blue Devils went 6-2 in the conference before beating Virginia on Saturday night in the ACC title game.
Duke is 17-9 in Diaz’s two seasons in Durham. In three seasons at Miami. The Hurricanes were 21-15. The best season of his tenure came in 2020, when Miami went 8-3.
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After his departure from Miami — who hired Mario Cristobal to replace him — Diaz was the defensive coordinator for Penn State for two seasons. That’s his only coaching experience in the Big Ten, but the Nittany Lions were 21-5 in his two years in State College. In 2023, Penn State ranked third in the nation in scoring defense, allowing 13.5 points per game and 4.2 yards per play.
Kalen DeBoer, Alabama
Yes, Alabama is still in the College Football Playoff. But it wasn’t hard to envision DeBoer at Michigan after the 2023 season if the Wolverines had looked for an outside hire instead of promoting Moore following Jim Harbaugh’s departure to the NFL.
Instead, DeBoer became the coach at Alabama and the Crimson Tide have now lost three games in back-to-back seasons. The standard Nick Saban set in Tuscaloosa was impossible to match. But you have to go back to the first two seasons of the Mike Shula era to find the last time that Alabama lost at least three games in consecutive seasons.
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If — if — DeBoer wanted to leave Tuscaloosa on his own accord following a potential loss to Oklahoma on Dec. 19, this could be as good an opportunity as he’ll ever get. And it would restart one of the wildest coaching cycles we’ve ever seen with an opening at Alabama set to ripple across the sport.
Jay Harbaugh, Seattle Seahawks
What if Michigan wanted to hire a Harbaugh who wasn’t penalized by the NCAA? Jay is currently the special teams coordinator for the Seattle Seahawks under former Michigan assistant Mike Macdonald. Before joining Seattle after the 2024 season, Harbaugh worked at Michigan since his dad was hired in 2015 and coached the team’s tight ends, running backs, special teams and safeties throughout his time with the school.
Harbaugh would be very, very familiar with the way things work at Michigan. But there’s a very good case to be made for the Wolverines to cut ties completely from the Jim Harbaugh era.
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Jesse Minter, Los Angeles Chargers
If Michigan doesn’t want to completely distance itself from the Harbaugh era and Minter would be intrigued by a return to college football, it could do far worse than the defensive coordinator from that 2023 national title team. Minter followed Jim Harbaugh to the Chargers and is in charge of a defense that’s allowing fewer than 21 points per game and has intercepted opposing QBs 15 times while allowing just 12 touchdown passes.
Yes, Minter was given a show-cause penalty as part of the NCAA’s penalties for recruiting violations that occurred during his time in Ann Arbor. However, his one-year show-cause penalty expires before 2025 concludes. Michigan could avoid NCAA red tape if it waited a bit to hire Minter, who would potentially want to finish out the Chargers’ season anyway.