Hot seat rankings have become a staple of the offseason. Shane Beamer, Jeff Lebby and even Josh Heupel are among the SEC coaches whose names have surfaced in those conversations this year.
But, who is facing the most pressure this season regardless of job security? That’s a different question that needs a broader lens than just head coaches.
Here’s our rankings heading into the 2026 season.
10. Aaron Murray and Matt Schumacker
Replacing a legend is one of the toughest jobs in sports. There’s a reason so few coaches were eager to follow Nick Saban.I’m not comparing the SEC Network’s night crew to the greatest coach of all time. But at a time when SEC and college football fans are weary of constant change, they represent one of the few constants left in the sport.
Aaron Murray is a rising star in media and should do a great job with Matt Schumacker, as they take over the primetime slot on the SEC Network. For the past nine years, Tom Hart, Cole Cubelic and Jordan Rodgers owned the SEC Network’s night window, becoming a familiar and beloved trio for fans every Saturday. This fall, ESPN opted for a new direction, marking yet another change for SEC fans.
9. Arch Manning
The pressure Manning faces this year pales in comparison to what it was a season ago. There’s also a case that there’s even more pressure this year considering the weapons Texas has put around him. Going into year one as a starter, Manning was a preseason Heisman favorite on a preseason No. 1 ranked team. That’s a pretty unfair burden to shoulder considering what the Longhorns had to replace from the 2024 team.
This year is different. Manning is in year two as a starter and will command what is certainly one of the most talented and expensive rosters in all of college football. Texas went on a spending spree in the portal to get him weapons on offense, and Manning will have an embarrassment of riches at his disposal. He played incredibly well for roughly three quarters of the season in 2025. However, this year he can’t afford to get off to a slow start like he did a year ago.
8. Ole Miss fans on Sept. 19th
Ole Miss fans don’t have to put on the pads and play on Sept. 19 against LSU. I’m not sure if they know that or not, so maybe this can serve as a reminder.
The confidence of the fanbase hasn’t decreased at all despite losing their head coach, offensive coordinator and several other key pieces from last year’s team. The overconfidence isn’t shocking because we are talking about SEC fans, afterall. Everyone is confident in June.
The nightmare scenario for fans in Oxford, though, is that they lose that game and take a massive step back while they watch their former coach lead a different program one state over to a CFP berth, or even worse, a national championship.
D-Day for fans on both sides is Sept. 19, and while the initial spread of that game was released at just 1.5 points from Sportsbooks, the over/under for deleted Twitter accounts that day will be much higher.
7. Josh Heupel
Personally, it feels like Heupel doesn’t belong on this list, but the growing sentiment of his fanbase is that he needs to win this year or the seat will start to warm.
The potential lack of grace this year is especially scary considering he’ll be starting a freshman at quarterback and hired a defensive coordinator whose defenses usually take a year to take shape as far as understanding and knowledge go.
Heupel has been incredibly successful in comparison to his predecessors in Knoxville, but that bar was very low. And, now that Tennessee fans have had a taste of success again, they want more and they want it now.
6. Kalen DeBoer
DeBoer isn’t going to be fired anytime soon, at least not without a massive financial burden. There’s still a ton of pressure to perform this season.
Making the College Football Playoff and winning 11 games should usually buy you some leniency and favor with a fanbase. It should probably garner some respect from other fanbases as well, but we don’t talk about Alabama the way we talk about other teams. They’re not an 11 win CFP team. They’re a back-to-back four loss team. They haven’t gone on the road and beat Georgia in the last six years. They’re the team that lost 28-7 with -3 yards rushing against them in Atlanta.
The taste in everyone’s mouth about Alabama is very much what they tasted in Pasadena last season when they lost 38-3. DeBoer still got a brand new contract for $87.5 million over seven years despite the embarrassment in the Rose Bowl.
Alabama heads into this season with just seven seniors, a new quarterback and an offensive line that was abysmal last season and may get worse after losing its best pieces.
If Alabama loses four games for a third straight year, you’re going to see a lot of irate, grammatically incorrect reactions from Alabama fans once again.
5. Arkansas AD Hunter Yurachek
Find someone that loves you the way Arkansas fans hate Hunter Yurachek.
This man brought in Coach Cal, fired a football coach that everyone wanted gone and just brought in a $70 million naming rights deal for the stadium. You would think he rehired Chad Morris the way Hog fans view him.
4. Shane Beamer
This one goes without saying. Beamer is on the hottest seat of anyone in the conference. The Gamecocks started ranked in the top 15 nationally a season ago and finished 4-8.
Beamer was given a great deal of resources and good faith to get this thing turned around this season. He was able to retain a ton of talent and bring in some top tier players from the portal. South Carolina’s schedule is difficult as always, but it’s the easiest it’s been in a decade by comparison. He needs to get to seven wins to feel safe.
3. Lane Kiffin
Kiffin isn’t on the hot seat, and his track record in the portal, as well as the level he’s recruited at so far, should show that this isn’t an all-in or else type of year in Baton Rouge.
The investment LSU has made into turnover to help turn the program around goes beyond wanting to be successful in just 2026. Kiffin has also been vocal about this turnaround not being instantaneous.
With the way this offseason has gone, the way he left Oxford and the expectations that LSU football has as a program in general, he has to win now.
2. Steve Sarkisian
If you talk to Longhorn fans, you’d assume that Texas has won 54 national titles in the last 53 years. That’s right, they were so good in 2005, they actually won two national titles in the same year.
No program in America has deeper pockets and better resources than Texas. They have the most fertile recruiting ground in America. They garner over $163 million in annual donations for the athletic department. That’s roughly $144 million more than the SEC team with the fewest (South Carolina). They’ve also been to the CFP in two of the last three seasons and were just shy of making it to the national championship. That’s not good enough.
This is a program that has won one national title in the last 56 years. If Sark can’t at least compete for one this season with a $40 million roster and five potential top-20 picks in next year’s NFL Draft, then some difficult conversations are going to have to be had.
1. The SEC as a whole
It’s been three years since an SEC team has played for a national title in football. They no longer have the highest television contracts, and they were essentially bullied into a nine game conference schedule without other Power Four conferences holding up their end of the agreement to explore CFP expansion in unison.
The SEC needs to win the national title this year and get their mojo back.
