Jon Sumrall hire: Josh Pate details why new HC will succeed if 'Florida is what Florida's supposed to be'

Lane Kiffin‘s choice of LSU seemed to set off a domino effect in the college football coaching carousel on Sunday. On the same day, Florida announced that it had hired Jon Sumrall to take over heading into the 2026 season.

It’s no secret that the Gators would have preferred Kiffin, but college football analyst Josh Pate doesn’t think they should be disappointed that Sumrall fell to them. The Tulane coach was on a lot of other schools’ radar after directing the Green Wave to a 10-2 record this season and playing for a spot in the College Football Playoff.

“If you’re gonna go from Lane Kiffin to anyone else in this coaching cycle, I get that you’re gonna be disappointed,” Pate said on Josh Pate’s College Football Show. “You shouldn’t be disappointed about Jon Sumrall. Truthfully, many of you don’t know a lot about Jon Sumrall, which is totally fine. Others of you are scarred in the Florida fan base because you just remember going to the G5 ranks in the state of Louisiana and bringing in a guy who ultimately failed. …Jon Sumrall is gonna be compared to Billy Napier, lazily, because he’s from the G5 ranks and the state of Louisiana and ‘We just hired a guy from the G5 and since he didn’t work out, no G5 coach could ever work out at Florida.’

“…I know Jon, so I’ve been around him so I know some of the things he has. Very much a type A, very much an alpha personality. He’s very intentional with the way he structures his program. I think most importantly, he’s very flexible. …Jon Sumrall’s the kind of guy who could go about things one way one year and, if it delivers C-minus results, wad it up and throw it in the garbage. ‘We’re gonna do it a totally different way. If that means me changing my philosophy, if it means me changing my staffers.’ He’s not just totally married to one way of doing things. He’s married to winning as a concept. But the other important note is he’s ascending. It’s my personal opinion that Jon Sumrall’s gonna be a big name in college football for some time.”

Pate added that he knows Sumrall is aware he was the second choice, but is excited to take on the challenge anyway. He encouraged Florida fans to be patient, saying there was a reason that the coach’s name was involved in other openings in the SEC.

Sumrall is a Kentucky alumnus and was a linebackers coach for the Wildcats and at Ole Miss earlier in his career. That SEC DNA combined with a winning mindset could be just what Florida needs to restore itself as a contender in the conference.

“What I will tell you in talking to him over the past couple of weeks is he’s keenly aware of the vibe around Florida,” Pate said. “He is not stupid. He is keenly aware that they wanted Lane Kiffin there and they didn’t get him and they got him instead. Jon Sumrall is the head coach at Florida and he is keenly aware of who the last head coach was at Florida. He is keenly aware of what level of football he came from, what state he came from and what he failed to do. It is only natural to draw the conclusion that the fan base would be very skeptical when they go that route again. He knows all that. I know cause he’s told me he knows all that.

“Now, I don’t think for a moment that he has any hesitance in taking the job or having the confidence he can do the job, and I think in very, very short order, Florida folks will buy into him. Not just because you have no other choice. I think Florida folks will buy into Jon Sumrall because he will get a really, really good staff in place down there and they’ll execute the vision and I think he’ll win there. I think there was a reason why his name was involved in every one of these coaching searches and it’s not just because his representation’s really good at floating his name out there. It’s because a lot of people view him as the next big thing in coaching circles.”

Finally, Pate came to the conclusion that the biggest question in whether Jon Sumrall will work out at Florida is whether he gets the proper support from the university. In this day and age of NIL, that is as important as the Xs and Os. If the Gators are willing to commit to that portion, Pate sees a world where the hire works out.

“Is Florida gonna be what Florida’s supposed to be?” he wondered. “There is a working theory out there, and I really can’t prove the validity of this. I know everyone has their theories. There’s a working theory out there that the reason Lane Kiffin sort of looked at Florida and then looked past Florida is because when they raised the hood on the program, they didn’t really like what was inside the engine. There were some things that were turn offs. …If that is the state of affairs down there then Florida’s got to make its mind up about how serious Florida is about winning football games and being a successful program. Because I don’t really care who you just hired if you don’t have the under-the-hood portion in a state of comparability to the other programs in the SEC. It doesn’t matter who’s in the driver’s seat.

“…So I ask the question, is Florida what Florida’s supposed to be? If Florida is what Florida’s supposed to be from a support standpoint, from an investment standpoint, then I think Jon Sumrall will win there. I think there is a world where you look around three or four years from now and you say, ‘You know what? In retrospect, I think we got the best guy for the job regardless of who we originally chased.'”