A look at college football coaches in new places, with their previous stop in parentheses:

Randy Shannon, Al Golden, Mark Richt and Manny Diaz all failed to bring Miami back, and now Cristobal is giving it his best shot, returning to his alma mater, where he won two national championships as a player. His track record is a mixed bag, a 62-60 record at Florida International and Oregon, and a 23-9 mark in the Pac-12 while with the Ducks. The Hurricanes haven’t won more than 10 games in a season since 2003, and Cristobal did win a pair of Pac-12 North crowns at his last stop.

Like Brent Venables at Oklahoma and Dan Lanning at Oregon, Freeman is making a major leap, from a coordinator to a first-time head coach at one of the top programs in the country. The 36-year-old Freeman does have a lot of coaching experience, working previously at Ohio State, Kent State, Purdue, Cincinnati and Notre Dame. But now he’s the boss, and he’s facing a gauntlet of a schedule, including matchups with Ohio State, North Carolina, BYU, Clemson and USC.

By far the most successful coach on this list, Kelly has led three different programs — Notre Dame, Cincinnati and Grand Valley State — to 12-win seasons. He raised the bar at Notre Dame, guiding the Irish to the College Football Playoff twice. But his inability to beat top teams — his teams in South Bend went 4-11 against foes ranked in the top 10 at the time — will not be tolerated at LSU.

The mastermind behind Georgia’s record-setting defense last year, the 36-year-old Lanning has climbed the ladder quickly. A Division II linebacker, he was a graduate assistant at Alabama just seven years ago, and now he is the head coach of one of the sport’s big brands, replacing Cristobal at Oregon.

The last three years at Louisiana, Napier went 33-5 and won the Sun Belt each season. It led to a massive step up, the job at Florida, which went 14-11 the last two years under Dan Mullen. A former quarterback himself with an extensive background as an offensive coach and coordinator, there is hope Napier can develop uber-talented sophomore Anthony Richardson into a force.

Venables returns to Norman where he was a defensive coordinator and assistant coach for 12 years. The former Kansas State linebacker, now 51, made a name for himself at Clemson, helping Dabo Swinney build the Tigers into one of the elite programs in the country and win two national championships.