Brian Kelly can join some elite company with a win over Army

Brian Kelly, one of the winningest active coaches in all of college football, can join elite company if the Tigers are able to take down Army on Saturday. Coach Kelly currently has 299 career wins as a head coach, and on Saturday, Kelly could become the 15th coach to hit 300 career wins.

Let's take a step back. Brian Kelly began his coaching career at Grand Valley State in 1991. He would coach there for 13 seasons, finishing with a 118-35-2 record at the division II school.

His next stop would come at Central Michigan where he would stay for three seasons. There, he would accumulate 19 more wins before moving on to Cincinnati. In four seasons with the Bearcats, Kelly would post an astounding 34-6 record and would earn a job at one of the most prestigious colleges in the nation, Notre Dame.

In 12 seasons with the Fighting Irish, Kelly would win another 113 games which included a trip to the BCS National Championship and the CFP National Championship.

Before the 2022 season, Kelly shocked the college football world by agreeing to become LSU's next head coach. He currently has a 15-6 record with the Tigers, and is one win shy of hitting the 300 mark.

When asked about this, Kelly said he was unaware of the stat because he doesn't count wins. All he's worried about is getting his team prepared every week and trying to win one game at a time.

"I don't really think about it that much. This is the first time I heard that's the case. I think when you love what you do, you're not counting wins. You're thinking about, what do we need to do from a player development stand point, what do we need to do to get better in this area. Listen, if I was thinking about wins, I would've been out of this business a long time ago."

Brian Kelly

Kelly said that when reflecting on his journey, he had no idea that he'd be in the coaching game this long. He thought back to his first game at Grand Valley State over 30 years ago and said the president of the university yelled from the press box, "who hired this guy?"

The Lakers would go on to finish the season 9-3 and appear in the Division II playoffs.

"Going back and looking at the journey, I had no idea I'd be in it this long. My first game, I remember the president at Grand Valley State opening up the press box window, and I could hear him because there was probably 300 people there, and he said 'who the hell hired this guy?' So I didn't think I was going to be in this business very long."

Brian Kelly

Although Kelly isn't giving much thought to his win, he is joining a very exclusive club of some of the best college football coaches of all time. With the win Saturday, Brian Kelly would have hit the 300 win mark in just 33 seasons. For reference, the only other head coach with over 300 wins that did it in less seasons was Larry Kehres, who had 332 wins in 27 seasons at Mount Union.

Even if he doesn't get it this weekend, which he likely will, Kelly will definitely hit the 300 win mark at some point this season. No matter how much he doesn't care about it, this is a monumental achievement and one that should be celebrated by LSU fans.