List of TCU Horned Frogs head football coaches

The TCU Horned Frogs college football team represents Texas Christian University (TCU) in the Big 12 Conference (Big 12). The Horned Frogs compete as part of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision. The program has had 31 head coaches, and one interim head coach, since it began play during the 1896 season. Since November 2021, Sonny Dykes has served as head coach at TCU.^[1]

Eight coaches have led TCU in postseason bowl games: William L. Driver, Dutch Meyer, Abe Martin, Jim Wacker, Pat Sullivan, Dennis Franchione, Gary Patterson, and Dykes. Seven of those coaches also won conference championships: Driver captured one as a member of the Texas Intercollegiate Athletic Association; Francis Schmidt captured two, Meyer three, Martin three, and Sullivan one as a member of the Southwest Conference; Franchione captured two as a member of the Western Athletic Conference; Patterson captured one as a member of Conference USA, four as a member of the Mountain West Conference, and one as a member of the Big 12 Conference.

Patterson is the leader in seasons coached with 21 years as head coach and games won with 181. Willis T. Stewart has the highest winning percentage at 0.889. Jim Shofner has the lowest winning percentage of those who have coached more than one game, with 0.061. Of the 31 different head coaches who have led the Horned Frogs, Matty Bell, Schmidt, Meyer, and Sullivan have been inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Key to symbols in coaches list
General		Overall		Conference		Postseason^{[A 1]}
No.	Order of coaches^{[A 2]}	GC	Games coached	CW	Conference wins	PW	Postseason wins
DC	Division championships	OW	Overall wins	CL	Conference losses	PL	Postseason losses
CC	Conference championships	OL	Overall losses	CT	Conference ties	PT	Postseason ties
NC	National championships	OT	Overall ties^{[A 3]}	C%	Conference winning percentage
†	Elected to the College Football Hall of Fame	O%	Overall winning percentage^{[A 4]}

Coaches

List of head football coaches showing season(s) coached, overall records, conference records, postseason records, championships and selected awards^{[A 5]}
No.	Name ^{[A 6]}	Season(s) ^{[A 7]}	GC	OW	OL	OT	O%	CW	CL	CT	C%	PW	PL	PT	CC	NC	Awards
1	Joe J. Field	1897	4	3	1	0	0.750	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
2	James Morrison	1898	5	1	3	1	0.300	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
3	H. E. Hildebrand	1902	6	0	5	1	0.083	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
4	C. E. Cronk	1904	6	1	4	1	0.250	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
5	Emory J. Hyde	1905–1907	23	10	11	2	0.478	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
6	Jesse R. Langley	1908–1909	17	11	5	1	0.676	2	0	0	1.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
7	Kemp Lewis	1910	9	2	6	1	0.278	0	1	0	.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
8	Henry W. Lever	1911	9	4	5	0	0.444	0	3	0	.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
9	Willis T. Stewart	1912	9	8	1	0	0.889	3	0	0	1.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
10	Fred Cahoon	1913	8	5	2	1	0.688	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
11	Stanley A. Boles	1914	10	4	4	2	0.500	2	2	0	0.500	—	—	—	0	—	—
12	Ewing Y. Freeland	1915	9	4	5	0	0.444	2	0	0	1.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
13	Milton Daniel	1916–1917	19	14	4	1	0.763	5	0	0	1.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
14	Ernest M. Tipton	1918	7	4	3	0	0.571	2	0	0	1.000	—	—	—	0	—	—
15	Ted D. Hackney	1919	8	1	7	0	0.125	1	4	0	0.200	—	—	—	0	—	—
16	William L. Driver	1920–1921	19	14	4	1	0.763	5	1	0	0.833	0	1	0	1	—	—
17	John McKnight	1922	10	2	5	3	0.350	0	3	2	0.200	0	0	0	0	—	—
18	Matty Bell^†	1923–1928	55	33	17	5	0.645	10	11	5	0.481	0	0	0	0	—	—
19	Francis Schmidt^†	1929–1933	57	46	6	5	0.851	22	5	2	0.793	0	0	0	2	—	—
20	Dutch Meyer^†	1934–1952	201	109	79	13	0.575	57	46	9	0.549	3	4	0	3	2 1935 1938	—
21	Abe Martin	1953–1966	145	74	64	7	0.534	46	42	3	0.522	1	3	1	3	0	—
22	Fred Taylor	1967–1970	41	15	25	1	0.378	13	15	0	0.464	0	0	0	0	0	—
23	Jim Pittman	1971	7	3	3	1	0.500	2	1	0	0.667	0	0	0	0	0	—
24	Billy Tohill	1971–1973	26	11	15	0	0.423	6	7	0	0.462	0	0	0	0	0	—
25	Jim Shofner	1974–1976	33	2	31	0	0.061	1	21	0	0.045	0	0	0	0	0	—
26	F. A. Dry	1977–1982	66	12	51	3	0.205	6	40	2	0.146	0	0	0	0	0	—
27	Jim Wacker	1983–1991	100	40	58	2	0.410	21	48	1	0.307	0	1	0	0	0	—
28	Pat Sullivan^†	1992–1997	67	24	42	1	0.366	14	30	0	0.318	0	1	0	1	0	—
29	Dennis Franchione	1998–2000	35	25	10	—	0.714	16	7	—	0.696	2	0	—	2	0	—
30	Gary Patterson	2000–2021	260	181	79	—	0.696	113	59	—	0.657	11	6	—	6	0	AFCA COY (2009, 2014) AP COY (2009, 2014) Bobby Dodd COY (2009) Eddie Robinson COY (2009, 2014) George Munger Award (2009) Liberty Mutual COY (2009) Sporting News COY (2009, 2014) Walter Camp COY (2009, 2014) Home Depot COY (2014) Paul "Bear" Bryant Award (2014)
Int.	Jerry Kill	2021	4	2	2	—	0.500	2	2	—	0.500	0	0	—	0	0	—
31	Sonny Dykes	2022–present	53	36	17	—	0.679	23	13	—	0.639	3	1	—	0	0	AFCA COY (2022) AP COY (2022) Eddie Robinson COY (2022) Walter Camp COY (2022) Sporting News COY (2022) Home Depot COY (2022) Paul "Bear" Bryant Award (2022)

v t e TCU Horned Frogs football
Venues	Panther Park (1911–1914, 1917, 1920–1923) Clark Field (1924–1930) Amon G. Carter Stadium (1930–present)
Bowls & rivalries	Bowl games Baylor SMU Texas Texas A&M Texas Tech
Culture & lore	Super Frog "TCU Fight" Texas Christian University Marching Band 1935 "Game of the Century"
People	Head coaches NFL draftees Statistical leaders
Seasons	1896 1897 1898 1899 1900 1901 1902 1903 1904 1905 1906 1907 1908 1909 1910 1911 1912 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1919 1920 1921 1922 1923 1924 1925 1926 1927 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934 1935 1936 1937 1938 1939 1940 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945 1946 1947 1948 1949 1950 1951 1952 1953 1954 1955 1956 1957 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025
National championship seasons in bold

List of TCU Horned Frogs head football coaches

Coaches

Notes

References

Related Articles