In December 2023, Ohio State was just coming off their brutal loss against Michigan, and Kyle McCord, their QB, was blamed for his fourth-quarter interception. The loss put Ryan Day on his toes, and McCord? He had an impressive season overall, passing for 3,170 yards at 65.8% efficiency. So, he demanded assurances to be QB1 in 2024 and an NIL pay bump. Ryan Day denied those assurances, and McCord ended up in the transfer portal, where he finally came to Fran Brown’s Syracuse. But as he joined Syracuse, the pressure wasn’t just on him but on the head coach, too, as Fran Brown recounts.

Brown was in his first year as head coach at Syracuse, a program that had underachieved over the years, finishing below .500 in four of the last five years. No one had imagined that Kyle McCord would join Syracuse, a contrast from a giant like Ohio State. But Fran Brown promised the QB to help him find his creativity and move away from the stress of the pressure cooker environment of Ohio State.  “I want to see you have fun. Go run, go score, do different things, and you just see him (getting) back to himself,” said Fran Brown. The result? It was breathtaking!

Together with McCord’s creativity and Fran Brown’s coaching prowess, Syracuse exceeded all expectations and finished 10-3 in the ACC. Moreover, who could forget their incredible comeback against 6th-ranked Miami, overcoming a 21-0 deficit? In that game, McCord passed for 354 yards and four touchdowns, orchestrating the biggest comeback in Syracuse’s history. As for creativity? We saw that against Georgia Tech, when McCord executed a 15-yard scramble for a first down, which symbolized his newfound freedom under Brown. Even Brown seemed impressed as he remarked, “That scramble meant a lot to our program.” But all this time, Fran Brown was under immense pressure.

Brown appeared on the 13th June episode of ‘Next Up with Adam Breneman’ and discussed how he turned around the Syracuse program. The discussion gradually shifted to McCord, and Breneman asked Brown, “What was it like coaching Kyle for a year?” The head coach quickly said, “At first I was nervous,” and detailed the whole ordeal.

“I didn’t want to mess up. I wanted him to play in the National Football League, and I wanted him to get every opportunity he had, because I had known him since he was a kid, and I didn’t want to mess up his chances of being able to play on Sunday. And I put a lot of pressure on myself when it came to coaching Kyle.” That pressure that Fran Brown took on himself ultimately bore fruit.

McCord was selected in the sixth round, as the 181st overall pick in the NFL draft by the Philadelphia Eagles. The feat is incredible since McCord was in his last year and lost an appeal to the NCAA for one more year of eligibility. The only chance he had was the NFL, which Brown made sure happened. And now that he has been selected, we might see him finally behind the center in the future for the Eagles. But this feat also demanded incredible sacrifice.

“I was nervous, I wanted to see him be successful, like it meant everything to me to see him and just all of those guys. But you know, especially him, because he took a shot with me, right? He took less than half the money that somebody else wanted to give him. He took half the money and came here with a leap of faith. And I forever owe him for that.” In a sense, McCord and Brown’s union was the best thing that happened to college football last year.

Kyle McCord found his footing at Syracuse and ended the season with 4,779 passing yards and breaking the ACC single-season record. Moreover, he threw for 300+ yards in 12 of the 13 games last year, which is just unworldly to replicate. His achievements symbolized how Brown’s innovative coaching philosophy-emphasizing DART (detailed, accountable, relentless, tough), made Brown an exceptional player. In turn, Brown became one of the most talked-about head coaches in CFB and Syracuse, one of the feel-good stories of last season.

Fran Brown recounts how he emerged from the Temple setback

Fran Brown became a head coach with not-so-optimistic circumstances at Syracuse. Dino Babers, who was the head coach of the program for 8 years, was fired, and he left a huge mess to clean up afterwards. $8.9 million buyout money, which was given to Babers, meant Syracuse was in financial loss and a high attrition. As for Brown, he was new in the head coaching world, and that had its downsides.

“Temple didn’t want to give me a job. They said I wasn’t a good enough coach. I didn’t have enough good experience. And they went with someone else who didn’t have experience as a coach instead of me, and that hurt. Like I cried when I didn’t get the job. The second time, it was extremely embarrassing. Because, first they put out that I was getting a job, and then it comes, I’m not,” said Brown.

Brown was the DBs coach at Georgia when this happened, and this was surely a jolt. But when Syracuse finally came up with their offer and approached him to be the head coach, all worries faded, and Brown knew that his wait had paid off. Brown’s favorite landing spot might have been Temple, as he said. But going to Syracuse was also something he wanted, and it was one of the programs on his list. “I said I wanted Temple, Syracuse, or Rutgers; I wanted to be in the Northeast,” said Brown. The verdict?

It’s simple, sometimes unexpected paths and setbacks lead you to your destiny, and that’s exactly what happened with Brown as he came to Syracuse.