Jim Harbaugh No. 12 In College Coach Power Rankings

Only 11 coaches are ahead of Jim Harbaugh in a recent batch of coach rankings.

Jim Harbaugh comes in at No. 12 on CBS sports writer Tom Fornelli's top 25 college coaches in the country, which is actually up three spots from last year.

Jim Harbaugh

: I've said plenty of times that, fairly or not, the world at large tends to spend more time focusing on what Harbaugh hasn't done at Michigan than what he has done. I don't think he's gotten enough credit for turning the program around, which isn't to say there's not plenty of work left. All that said, I was still surprised to see him climb in the rankings after a 9-4 season and failing to beat Ohio State again. I also can't help but wonder what happens if he does beat Ohio State. He might jump into the top 10.

2019 rank: 15 (+3)

We've discussed Harbaugh's accomplishments and failures ad nauseam. He wins most of the games he should but can't hang with Ohio State and hasn't fared well in bowl games. That pretty much sums up what he's done at U-M and accounts for his 47-18 record overall. He's obviously 0-5 against Ohio State, which really is unacceptable, and he'd say the same thing. 

In fact, he pretty much did earlier today on NBC Sports’ Lunch Talk Live with Mike Tirico.

“We’ve got to beat Ohio State. Nothing makes us angrier than that, or me," Harbaugh said. "That’s what we’re working toward every day. We’ve beaten everyone else, but we haven’t beaten them. That’s what we have to do. [We have to] beat them, win a championship, get ourselves into the playoffs and win a national championship.”

That's what Harbaugh was expected to do when he was hired at Michigan but he's fallen short in every one of those areas. On the positive side, he's winning regularly, has shifted momentum back to U-M in the rivalry against Michigan State, is recruiting well and is hiring solid assistant coaches pretty often. However, until he beats Ohio State and checks some of the bigger boxes, he's going to fall outside of the top ten and receive some deserved criticism.