List of Tulane Green Wave head football coaches

The Tulane Green Wave college football team represents Tulane University in the American Athletic Conference (AAC). The Green Wave compete as part of the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision. The program has had 43 head coaches since it began play during the 1893 season. Since 2026, Will Hall has served as head coach at Tulane.^[1]

Thirteen coaches have led Tulane in postseason bowl games: R. R. Brown, Bernie Bierman, Ted Cox, Red Dawson, Jim Pittman, Bennie Ellender, Larry Smith, Vince Gibson, Mack Brown, Chris Scelfo, Curtis Johnson, Willie Fritz, and Jon Sumrall. Six of those coaches also won conference championships: Cox, Dawson, and Henry Frnka each captured one as a member of the Southeastern Conference; Tommy Bowden captured one as a member of Conference USA; and Fritz and Sumrall each captured one as a member of the AAC. In 2025, Sumrall led Tulane to the program’s first-ever College Football Playoff berth.

Clark Shaughnessy is the leader in seasons coached, with 11 years as head coach and games won with 59. Willie Fritz is the leader in games coached, at 101 games overall. H. T. Summersgill has the highest winning percentage at 0.909. Fred Sweet and Mark Hutson have the lowest winning percentage of those who have coached more than one game, with 0.000. Of the 42 different head coaches who have led the Green Wave, Shaughnessy, Bierman, Claude Simons Jr., and Brown 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	Term	GC	OW	OL	OT	O%	CW	CL	CT	C%	PW	PL	CCs
1	T. L. Bayne	1893 1895	8	4	4	0	0.500	1	2	0	0.333	—	—	0
2	Fred Sweet	1894	4	0	4	0	.000	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
3	Harry Baum	1896	5	3	2	0	0.600	1	2	0	0.333	—	—	0
4	John Lombard	1898	2	1	1	0	0.500	1	1	0	0.500	—	—	0
5	Harris T. Collier	1899	7	0	6	1	0.071	0	5	0	.000	—	—	0
6	H. T. Summersgill	1900–1901	11	10	1	0	0.909	6	0	0	1.000	—	—	0
7	Virginius Dabney	1902	7	1	4	2	0.286	0	4	2	0.167	—	—	0
8	Charles Eshleman	1903	5	2	2	1	0.500	0	1	1	0.250	—	—	0
9	Thomas A. Barry	1904	7	5	2	0	0.714	3	2	0	0.600	—	—	0
10	John F. Tobin	1905	1	0	1	0	.000	0	1	0	.000	—	—	0
11	John Russ	1906	5	0	4	1	0.100	0	3	0	.000	—	—	0
12	Joe Curtis	1907–1908	13	10	3	0	0.769	3	1	0	0.750	—	—	0
13	R. R. Brown	1909	9	4	3	2	0.556	2	0	2	0.750	0	1	0
14	Appleton A. Mason	1910–1912	24	10	13	1	0.438	4	10	0	0.286	0	0	0
15	A. C. Hoffman	1913	8	3	5	0	0.375	0	4	0	.000	0	0	0
16	Edwin Sweetland	1914	7	3	3	1	0.500	0	3	1	0.125	0	0	0
17	Clark Shaughnessy^†	1915–1920 1922–1926	94	59	28	7	0.665	26	19	3	0.573	0	0	0
18	Myron Fuller	1921	10	4	6	0	0.400	2	2	0	0.500	0	0	0
19	Bernie Bierman^†	1927–1931	49	36	10	3	0.765	24	8	2	0.735	0	1	0
20	Ted Cox	1932–1935	40	28	10	2	0.725	20	7	2	0.724	1	0	1
21	Red Dawson	1936–1941	59	36	19	4	0.644	16	13	3	0.547	0	1	1
22	Claude Simons Jr.^†	1942–1945	31	13	17	1	0.435	4	10	1	0.300	0	0	0
23	Henry Frnka	1946–1951	58	31	23	4	0.569	18	15	3	0.542	0	0	1
24	Raymond Wolf	1952–1953	20	6	13	1	0.325	3	11	0	0.214	0	0	0
25	Andy Pilney	1954–1961	80	25	49	6	0.350	11	36	4	0.255	0	0	0
26	Tommy O'Boyle	1962–1965	40	6	33	1	0.163	2	23	1	0.096	0	0	0
27	Jim Pittman	1966–1970	52	21	30	1	0.413	—	—	—	—	1	0	—
28	Bennie Ellender	1971–1975	56	27	29	0	0.482	—	—	—	—	0	1	—
29	Larry Smith	1976–1979	45	18	27	0	0.400	—	—	—	—	0	1	—
30	Vince Gibson	1980–1982	34	17	17	0	0.500	—	—	—	—	0	1	—
31	Wally English	1983–1984	22	5	17	0	0.227	—	—	—	—	0	0	—
32	Mack Brown^†	1985–1987	34	11	23	0	0.324	—	—	—	—	0	1	—
33	Greg Davis	1988–1991	45	14	31	0	0.311	—	—	—	—	0	0	—
34	Buddy Teevens	1992–1996	56	11	45	0	0.196	1	4	—	0.200	0	0	0
35	Tommy Bowden	1997–1998	22	18	4	—	0.818	11	1	—	0.917	0	0	1
36	Chris Scelfo	1998–2006	94	37	57	—	0.394	18	42	—	0.300	2	0	0
37	Bob Toledo	2007–2011	61	15	46	—	0.246	8	32	—	0.200	0	0	0
38	Mark Hutson	2011	6	0	6	—	.000	0	5	—	.000	0	0	0
39	Curtis Johnson	2012–2015	49	15	34	—	0.306	10	22	—	0.313	0	1	0
40	Willie Fritz^[5]	2016–2023	101	54	47	—	0.535	31	33	—	0.484	3	1	1
41	Slade Nagle	2023	1	0	1	—	.000	—	—	—	—	0	1	0
42	Jon Sumrall	2024–2025	28	20	8	—	0.714	14	2	—	0.875	0	2	1
43	Will Hall	2026–present	0	0	0	—	–	0	0	—	–	0	0	0

v t e Tulane Green Wave football
Venues	Sportsman's Park (1893–1894) Tulane Athletic Field (1895–1901) Athletic Park (1902–1907) Pelican Park (1908) First Tulane Stadium (1909–1916) Second Tulane Stadium (1917–1925) Third Tulane Stadium (1926–1974) Louisiana Superdome (1975–2013) Tad Gormley Stadium (2002–2004, 2008) (alternate) Yulman Stadium (2014–present)
Bowls & rivalries	Bowl games Auburn LSU: Battle for the Rag Ole Miss Southern Miss: Battle for the Bell
Culture & lore	History Riptide "The Olive and the Blue" "The Hullabaloo" Marching Band Porter Cup Effect of Hurricane Katrina The Ten Win Turnaround
People	Head coaches NFL draftees All-Americans Statistical leaders
Seasons	1893 1894 1895 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

List of Tulane Green Wave head football coaches

Coaches

Notes

References

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