Tulane Green Wave fans don’t need a lesson in sucking it up and getting over the sting of losing their head coach to a Power Four program as Jon Sumrall has taken the job with the Florida Gators. They don’t need to be told that it comes with success. But it’s important to look through a lens with perspective, and to see that things are different than they were in 2023 despite it feeling like the same song.

In the last two years that rumors have swirled about head coaches departing from the program, the product on the field has felt the effects. But the loss that sticks out most is the 2023 American Conference Championship loss when the news broke five minutes before the team took the field that former coach Willie Fritz was leaving for the Houston Cougars. It gave the team no time to process and to hear it from their coach in advance.

In last year’s championship loss to the Army Black Knights, the outside noise hung over that one as well. While Sumrall didn’t end up leaving for another opportunity, the potential that those rumors played a role haunted him as he changed his approach this season. He addressed the noise head on as the weeks went by.

There’s no way to get around the systemic failures of the college football calendar, and it’s not fair to the Green Wave players to have this bleed in to the end of their regular season. A defense doesn’t post a shutout with their heads out of the contest, no matter how many wins their opponent has. It was clear that by preempting this unavoidable truth throughout the year, the players were able to close the regular season out right. By Friday, they will have days to process the loss and re-focus their sights in front of them.

Because while the next hire will be crucial for the program, the finish of this team's season stands to leave a legacy that should withstand the head coach. With their tenth win on Saturday, Tulane has now had three ten-win seasons in the last four years. They only have six seasons in program history that reached that mark – the others in 1998, 1934, and 1931. While Fritz has a lot to do with that, being responsible for two of those, Sumrall solidified the golden era of football this program is seeing out.

The Green Wave were a rising Group of Five team with a ton of potential when Sumrall took over. The foundation was built, but it was a bit of a glass house. Player leadership played as much of a role in those successful seasons under Fritz, and all of those players graduated the year Fritz left, including quarterback Michael Pratt. And when Fritz left immediately after the championship loss, it could have just as easily been a mass exodus.

That’s where the culture of the program took over under the leadership of the NIL collective, led by former players Michael Arata and Jimmy Ordeneaux. They had lost their head coach when they were players. They knew the importance of their presence outside that meeting room to pick those players up after Fritz got on the plane. That’s a level of culture that’s deeper than a coach hire, and one that will remain when Sumrall is gone.

The G5 is never going to match the SEC in resources. But that doesn’t mean there’s no point in fighting for it. There is a level of investment that still needs growing but has been cultivated and watered over the last four years as the football program has risen. The next hire will have an indoor practice facility. While that’s low on the list of priorities in the NIL era, it shows that the school is willing to put money into the little things. Those are what build the foundational blocks more than splash moves.

Another thing that builds foundations is winning conference championships. Some fans might not agree that the best chance at doing that is with Sumrall still as head coach. This isn’t Lane Kiffin going to LSU to an inter-conference rival. This wasn’t a saga where Sumrall made himself the Bachelor and took focus from the players. This isn’t the same era of college football that Fritz’s departure took place in. Player movement with the transfer portal and NIL has made the players more like adults in the room than kids, and Sumrall has treated them as such with his honesty throughout this process.

That focus and energy was palpable in Monday’s practice. If the players can keep their heads in the games, so can fans to support this team the right way and give them roaring home field advantage for a win this Friday, one that should send the victor to the College Football Playoff. Then you can worry about the hire for next season. But these players deserve to have silence on the outside noise.

After that, yes, the Green Wave enter the unknown, and there’s no immediate obvious candidate like Sumrall. Signing day is on Wednesday, and that’s important for the program to be able to continue its recruiting prowess. That’s something Sumrall helped with, as he got on a Zoom call with the current recruits on Sunday to sell them on sticking with the program. But it’s equally important not to rush this result. If the culture that has been cultivated is real, it is poised to continue momentum under the next leader. A week or two shouldn’t change that. If so, it was a house of cards all along.