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South Florida

Bulls · American Athletic

Head coach Brian Hartline Year 1 with South Florida

Year-1 HCs (2015-2024) averaged -0.19 W vs. preseason expectation

Season Projection · 2026 W0

10,000 sims
8.9
Expected wins
9-3
Proj record
6 to 11
Win range (90%)
#29 (15–52)
Final rank (90%)
10%
Make playoff
32%
Win conference

Path to Glory

Tap a win or a loss on each pivotal game to see how the playoff probability shifts. Leave any game unset to average across both outcomes.

Make the playoff

10%

Baseline projection.

  • at East Carolina
    Away · Nov 7
  • vs Tulane
    Home · Nov 27
  • at UTSA
    Away · Oct 8
  • vs Memphis
    Home · Nov 13
  • at Army
    Away · Sep 12

Pivotal games are the 5 with the largest playoff-probability swing, ranked by the model. Math: chained Bayesian log-odds update from the conditional simulation set; gets the directionally right answer but won't perfectly capture cross-game correlations until the full Monte Carlo pipeline lands.

Returning production · 2026

21 score
  • Quarterback 0% (0/5 )
  • Offensive line 47% (9/19 players)
  • Skill (RB/WR/TE) 28% (14/34 )
  • Front 7 (DL/LB) 14% (14/29 )
  • Secondary 16% (10/24 )
  • Special teams 36% (4/7 )

Share of last season's production each unit returns. Higher means more continuity: 70%+ is healthy, 45–70% a normal rebuild, under 45% a major turnover.

Portal additions · 2026

+0.9 rating

42 proven transfers in, carrying the production below from their prior school.

  • Ayden Jackson DB ← Georgia Southern 149 impact
  • Kenny Odom WR ← UTEP 117 impact
  • D.J. Crowther RB ← Dartmouth 73 impact
  • Shamar Meikle LB ← Oregon State 70 impact
  • MarShon Oxley LB ← West Virginia 57 impact
  • Za'Quan Bryan CB ← Minnesota 54 impact

Impact scores offensive skill additions (QB/RB/WR/TE) — prior-season production normalized within position (100 ≈ a 90th-percentile producer at that spot) and discounted for non-FBS competition, so a top back counts alongside a top quarterback. Defensive and O-line additions count as transfers but aren't box-score measurable, so they carry no impact score. The rating figure is this class's portal contribution vs. the FBS average, capped at ±2.5.

If QB1 is out (Byrum Brown)

GIE projects a -5.7 rating drop and a -23.0pp shift in playoff probability if South Florida loses its QB1 for an extended stretch. (n=1 historical samples; pooled across recent seasons.)

Situational efficiency · 2025

FBS percentile rank
  • 3rd-down conversion 45.2% 94th — elite
  • Red-zone TD rate 19.4% 86th — strong
  • 4th-down aggression 38.9% 65th — average
  • Late & close 6.3 yds/play 78th — strong

Percentile is across all FBS teams with play-by-play data for the season. "Late & close" is yards per play in Q4+ with a one-score margin — a proxy for clutch offensive performance.

More coming

Per-team pages get the full treatment in Phase 3: current rating, season projection histogram, schedule with win probabilities, and live overlays on Pylon stream days. For now, this page exists so stories and news have a permanent home as content rolls in.