Texas State Athletics

After 40 seasons as a football coach and 30 years as a collegiate head coach, Dennis Franchione announced his retirement. Franchione was among the top three active NCAA Division I FBS head coaches with 213 wins and owned a 213-135-2 career record when he retired.

Throughout his illustrious career, he led his teams to nine conference championships and had the best divisional record during another season. In addition, his teams played in nine bowl games and five playoff games.
 
Franchione also served two stints as head coach at Texas State and hada 39-43 record in his seven seasons at the school.

His first stint came during the 1990 and 1991 seasons when he recorded a 13-9 cumulative record. In 1990, Franchione led the Bobcats to a 6-5 record in his first year. It was Texas State’s first winning record as a member of the Southland Conference, the first winning season as a Division I FCS member and first winning season since 1984.
 
The following year, Franchione led the Bobcats to their second straight winning season, a feat that was not duplicated until Texas State had back-to-back winning seasons in 2008 and 2009.
 
He returned to the school in 2011 to lead Texas State’s transition  from the NCAA Division I FCS to the FBS ranks. During the transition, he led the Bobcats to three non-losing seasons in the last five seasons. Texas State finished with 6-6 records in 2011 and 2013, before winning seven games in 2014.

Texas State became bowl eligible for the first time in its second season of playing in the FBS during the 2013 campaign to equal the shortest span it took for a school to become bowl eligible since Marshall accomplished the feat in 1999. The Bobcats also were in their first year as a member of the Sun Belt Conference, which finished the season as the toughest non-automatic qualifying conference in the FBS ranks.

In 2014, Franchione guided Texas State to a 7-5 mark to make the Bobcats bowl eligible for a second straight year. He also produced a Fourth-Team All-American linebacker, a Sun Belt Conference Defensive Player of the Year and a pair of NFL Draft picks.
 
His collegiate head-coaching career began at Southwestern College in 1981, when he compiled a 14-4-2 record in two seasons. In 1982, the Builders won nine games, a Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference championship and beat Oklahoma Panhandle State 15-0 in the Sunflower Bowl.
 
It was Southwestern College’s first bowl game and the nine victories tied the school’s single-season record that was previously set in 1967. Following the record-setting season, Franchione went to Tennessee Tech, where he served as the offensive coordinator in 1983 and 1984 before becoming head coach at his alma mater, Pittsburg State.
 
During the next five seasons, he led the Gorillas to a 53-6 record, 4 Central States Intercollegiate Conference championships and 1 Missouri Intercollegiate Athletic Association title with a combined record of 37-1. He earned NAIA National Coach of the Year honors twice. His teams tied the school record with 11 victories in a season three times before breaking it with a 12-win campaign in 1989 when Pittsburg State joined the NCAA Division II ranks.
 
Franchione joined the FBS head coaching ranks for the first time when he took over New Mexico’s program in 1992. .
 
 Before his arrival, New Mexico had won just 26 of its previous 106 games. During his six seasons with the Lobos, Franchione compiled a 33-36 record and had three winning seasons. He led the Lobos to their first winning record in 11 years with a 6-5 record in 1993. Franchione also guided New Mexico to its first back-to-back winning campaigns since 1971 when the Lobos posted a 6-5 record in 1996 and a 9-4 mark in 1997.  The 1997 New Mexico team won the Western Athletic Conference’s Mountain Division with a 7-1 league record and played in the Insight.com Bowl. It was the school’s first bowl game since 1961. While he was at New Mexico, Franchione recruited and coached future NFL Pro Bowl linebacker Brian Urlacher during his freshman and sophomore seasons in 1996 and 1997. Urlacher recorded over 102 tackles to rank second on the team in 1997.
 
Franchione also produced Third-Team All-American receiver Pascal Volz and a pair of WAC Offensive Players of the Year in quarterbacks Stoney Case (1994) and Graham Leigh (1997) while he was at New Mexico.
 
Following the Insight Bowl, Franchione moved to TCU in 1998 and quickly turned around the fortunes of the school’s football program.
 
The year before he joined the Horned Frogs, TCU had finished the previous season with a 1-10 record. In his first year at the helm, Franchione led them to a 7-5 mark and a 28-19 victory over USC in the Sun Bowl. The Horned Frogs scored a school-record six defensive touchdowns, intercepted 12 passes and held opponents to an average of 19.6 points per game – the lowest average in over 30 years. His offense featured running back Basil Mitchell, who gained 1,111 yards and scored six touchdowns. Mitchell rushed for 185 yards and two touchdowns in the 28-19 win over USC.
 
The next season, Franchione also led TCU to the inaugural Mobile Alabama Bowl when LaDainian Tomlinson burst onto the national scene by leading the nation in rushing with 1,850 yards and 18 touchdowns on 268 carries. The Horned Frogs posted two shutouts and led the Western Athletic Conference in every major defensive category. TCU won the WAC championship and upset No. 20 East Carolina 28-14 in the bowl game as Tomlinson ran for 124 yards and two touchdowns. In 2000, Tomlinson was a Doak Walker Award winner and a finalist for the Heisman Trophy, Football News National Offensive Player of the Year and an unanimous All-American after running for 2,158 yards, the fourth-highest single season total in NCAA history. He also scored 22 touchdowns as TCU finished the season with a 10-1 record, a WAC championship and a second-straight berth to the Mobile Alabama Bowl. Defensively, the Horned Frogs allowed only 245.0 total yards and 9.6 points per game, ranking first in the nation in both categories.
 
Following the 2000 campaign, Franchione was named the head coach at Alabama after the Crimson Tide finished the previous season with a 3-8 record. In his first season, he led the Tide to a 7-5 record and a 14-13 victory over Iowa State in the Independence Bowl, giving Alabama its first bowl victory in five years.
 
In 2002, he led the Crimson Tide to a 10-3 mark and placed first in the SEC West Division with a 6-2 league record. However, previous NCAA sanctions made Alabama ineligible to play in a bowl game and the SEC Championship Game. Following Alabama’s victory over Hawaii at the end of the regular season, Franchione was named head coach at Texas A&M.  
 
During the next five seasons, his Aggies posted three winning records and played in three bowl games. Texas A&M finished the 2004 season with a 7-5 mark and played in the Cotton Bowl, the Aggies’ first bowl game in three seasons. His best season at the school came in 2006 when the Aggies won nine games and played in the Holiday Bowl. The next year, Texas A&M posted a 7-5 record and qualified to play in the Alamo Bowl. However, Franchione resigned as head coach prior to the bowl game and ended his tenure at the school with a 32-28 record. His recruiting classes were ranked among the Top 13 nationally from 2003-05.
 
Franchione also worked in broadcasting for three years prior to his return to coaching at Texas State, including two seasons as an analyst for ESPN Radio in 2008 and 2009.
 
Born March 28, 1951 in Girard, Kan., he is a graduate of Pittsburg State, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in physical education and received an Alumni Meritorious Achievement Award.

He and his wife, Kim, have two daughters, Ashley and Libby. He also has a son, Brad, who also coached at Texas State from 2011-15. Brad and his wife, Rebecca, have two sons, Wyatt and Gunnar, and a daughter, Isabella.

Franchione and Kim also formed the Coach Fran Charities, a nonprofit organization assists children with special needs and other charitable causes.