Blog Article
Charles Huff Took Southern Miss From 1-11 to 7-5 In One Season. Now He’s At Memphis—His Third Job In Three Years.
Charles Huff fixes broken programs.
That’s the value proposition Memphis is buying. Not a recruiter who needs five years to build his guys. Not a developmental coach who grows freshmen into seniors. Huff is a fixer — a guy who walks into a disaster, flips the portal, resets the culture, and delivers wins fast.
The pattern is clear now.
And if you’re trying to understand what Memphis is getting (and what they’re risking), you need to see how the pattern repeats.
The Southern Miss Fix: 1-11 to 7-5 In One Year
Huff inherited a catastrophe.
Here’s how he did it:
Turnover Margin
Through 10 games, Southern Miss forced 25 turnovers while committing only 12. That’s a +1.30 margin per game — top three nationally. Those takeaways produced 61 points and shortened the field for an offense still finding its footing.
Portal reconstruction.
Huff didn’t try to develop the 1-11 roster. He replaced it. New faces, new expectations, new standards. The veterans who stayed had to buy in or get out.
Defensive identity.
Coordinator Jason Semore’s unit was top-tier in red-zone defense and strong against the run. The offense didn’t need to be special. It just needed to not lose games.
Close-game composure.
The 2024 team was routinely outclassed and out of games early. The 2025 team finished. Multiple tight conference wins late in the year.
- Huff talked about confronting the “scar tissue” of the previous season.
- His team played like they believed him.
- But here’s the tension in the splits:
- Late-season record at Southern Miss: 1-3 (.250).
- The turnaround was real. The finish wasn’t. After starting 6-2, Southern Miss dropped three of their last four.
And then Huff left.
The Marshall Fix: 32-20 With A Top-10 Upset
Southern Miss wasn’t the first time.
Huff arrived at Marshall in 2021 with a Saban pedigree and a recruiting reputation. Four years later, he left with a 32-20 record, a Sun Belt title, and the signature win of his career: a road upset of #8 Notre Dame in 2022.
The splits tell the story of a coach who built something real:
- Late-season record: 12-5 (.706)
- Road record: 13-6 (.684)
- Bowl record: 1-2
Marshall under Huff wasn’t elite. Advanced metrics rated them as respectable but not dominant at the G5 level. But they were consistently competitive, consistently bowling, and occasionally dangerous.
- The late-season finishing that disappeared at Southern Miss? It was there at Marshall.
- The difference: he had four years to build it.
Then he left for Southern Miss.
The Memphis Play: Same Playbook, Bigger Stage
This is a different setup than Marshall or Southern Miss.
Huff isn’t walking into a crater. Memphis went 8-4 in 2025, climbed as high as #22 in the polls, and returns a relatively healthy roster. Ryan Silverfield left for Arkansas. Reggie Howard handled the bowl.
The bones are there.
Huff is attacking it the same way anyway.
The portal haul is already significant:
- Air Noland (QB, South Carolina) — former blue-chip, 3,500-yard passer, projected starter
- Dallan Hayden (RB, Colorado) — ex-Ohio State signee with Big Ten/Big 12 experience
- J’Mond Tapp (EDGE, Southern Miss) — All-Sun Belt, 70 tackles, 7.5 sacks
- Michael Montgomery (LB, Southern Miss) — All-Sun Belt, knows Semore’s system
- Ian Foster (DB, Southern Miss) — All-Sun Belt, ball production in the secondary
He’s importing proven production to raise the talent ceiling immediately.
Same playbook. Same urgency.
The staff reflects it too. Kevin Decker comes from Old Dominion, where his offense averaged 460+ yards per game with tempo and spread concepts. Jason Semore followed from Southern Miss to run the defense. Ben Ashford, Huff’s long-time strength coach, is the culture anchor.
Everything is built for Year 1 impact.
The Risk: Three Jobs In Three Years
Here’s what Memphis is betting against:
Charles Huff has never stayed anywhere long enough to see what happens after Year 4.
This is his third head job in three years. Marshall to Southern Miss to Memphis — each time chasing a bigger opportunity, each time leaving before the program had to answer harder questions about depth, development, and sustained excellence.
The turnaround pattern is proven.
The sustainability pattern doesn’t exist yet.
At Marshall, he built something and left before the conference-title team had to defend it. At Southern Miss, he engineered a miracle year and left before finding out if it was a mirage. Now at Memphis, he inherits an 8-4 roster and a program with CFP aspirations in a realigning AAC.
The questions he has to answer:
- Can he win when he’s not the underdog?
- Can he develop a roster instead of just replacing one?
- Can he stay?
The splits say Huff is a .609 coach who wins on the road, finishes strong at his longer stops, and hasn’t proven much against ranked opponents or in bowl games.
The narrative says he’s an elevator.
But elevators go both directions.
Memphis is betting he keeps going up.
They’re also betting he doesn’t get off at the next floor.
