Image via Eastern Michigan Athletics
Toledo: How’d they get here?
Seven recruiting titles. Two actual championship victories.
The most wins by a coach in school history, but all of the success Jason Candle achieved at Toledo also felt coupled with years and years of letdowns.
It’s not an exact science, but let’s even look at the years of preseason coaches polls. In 2017, Candle’s second season as head coach, the media and coaches both overwhelmingly picked Toledo as West and league favorites, and the team held to that standard.
The coaches and media* picked Toledo as division or league favorites four more times since then, but Toledo won the MAC title just once more in 2022 when it was tabbed to finish second in the West by both polls (zero first-place votes in the coaches’ poll).
*Note: There have been no preseason MAC media polls since the 2022 season.
Candle’s head coaching career came (81-44 overall, 53-25 MAC) directly off the heels of Matt Campbell’s 2015 team, which finished the regular season in a 4-way tie for the West division title as it matched Western Michigan, Northern Illinois, and Central Michigan with a 6-2 league record.
The second Candle-led Toledo team was a high-achieving, pass-happy team that won most of its games by comfortable margins, and had no problems putting Akron to bed in the MAC title game (45-28).
Then Candle’s program lost momentum. Winning stopped being so easy all of a sudden. In 2018, Toledo failed to find a 3-game win streak anywhere on the schedule. In 2019, Candle’s team finished fifth out of six teams in the West.
By 2021, Candle started losing more home games. Toledo lost to Colorado State (3-9 record), Northern Illinois (MAC champs; winless the year before), and Eastern Michigan (7-6 record) all at home.
Toledo nearly lost in Ypsilanti in 2022, and its 3-point win that day saved UT’s chances of going to the MAC championship game that season, as both UT and EMU finished with 5-3 MAC records.
Candle’s 2023 team finished the regular season with a perfect record in league play, and only one loss (by 2 at Illinois) before Miami OH beat the #23-ranked Rockets 23-14 in Detroit.
2015 (Matt Campbell): 10-2 (6-2 MAC); MAC West co-champions
2016 (Jason Candle): 9-4 (6-2 MAC)
2017 (Jason Candle): 11-3 (7-1 MAC); MAC champions
2018 (Jason Candle): 7-6 (5-3 MAC)
2019 (Jason Candle): 6-6 (3-5 MAC)
2020 (Jason Candle): 4-2 (4-2 MAC)
2021 (Jason Candle): 7-6 (5-3 MAC)
2022 (Jason Candle): 9-5 (5-3 MAC); MAC champions
2023 (Jason Candle): 11-3 (8-0 MAC); MAC West champions
2024 (Jason Candle): 8-5 (4-4 MAC)
2025 (Jason Candle): 8-5 (6-2 MAC)
Ten years of Candle later, he didn’t take a big, Power-level head coaching position many expected him to have after his 2017 title-winning season. He left for UConn, a traditional non-power in the sport, whose popularity on campus is comfortably behind the school’s men’s and women’s basketball teams.
As Toledo exists in a sport that’s gone global in its recruiting, it found its next coach around town. Mike Jacobs, from Maumee (right outside of Toledo), was hired from Mercer with 10 years of head coaching experience and, like Candle at Toledo, has had zero losing seasons in those years.
Jacobs (94-23 overall, 73-11 league play) was promoted from defensive coordinator to head coach at D2-level Notre Dame in northern Ohio (now-defunct, sadly), and won 84% of his games and reached the D2 playoff semifinal round twice. In four years at Lenoir-Rhyne (his first being a Covid-shortened spring season), his Bears won three division titles and got to the D2 playoffs twice; they made the semifinal round in 2023.
In two years at Mercer, his new Bears made the FCS D1 playoff in both seasons, and claimed the Southern Conference title both times for his sixth and seventh career league victories.
Jacobs, additionally, is a former Ohio State offensive lineman and long snapper, and his coaching career began in Ypsilanti as an EMU graduate assistant (2002-03) for Jeff Woodruff.
Toledo, no doubt, has been a source of great talent. Even the NFL teams that drafted Quinyon Mitchell or Emmanuel McNeil-Warren in the early rounds of the draft will tell you that Candle’s teams had the talent. Since 2017, the Rockets have had 13 players drafted, five in the first three rounds. Before that, the last time an NFL team drafted a Toledo player was back in 2008.
Toledo doesn’t have a talent problem today, even if Candle plucked some of his favorite still-eligible players from the Rocket roster. Toledo wasn’t without a returning quarterback, and Jacobs is excited to show the FBS what some of his FCS All-Americans can do in the MAC.
PLAYERS OF NOTE
QB John Alan Richter — A fifth-year signee at Toledo who will be making his first season as the offense’s starter. He made his first career start in 2024 (beat Northern Illinois, 13-6) and had a trio of appearances last season. So far for his career, Richter has put up 699 yards passing (63/96, 7 TD, 1 INT) and 40 rushing (18 att.).
WR Rico Bond — Bond was one of the top freshmen receivers in all of college football in 2025 with Lindenwood. He was a finalist for the Jerry Rice Award and First Team All-OVC/Big South for his 61 catches for 701 yards and 6 touchdowns scored.
WR Adjatay Dabbs — Dabbs was Mercer’s top receiver as a third-year sophomore in 2025. In his 25-game career, Dabbs has caught 73 passes for 1,273 yards and scored 11 touchdowns. He also had 5 rushes for 25 yards (1 score). Dabbs was named First Team All-Southern Conference last season.
DE, Andrew Zock — Zock is perhaps the most-anticipated defensive transfer in the league. Zock follows his head coach from Mercer, where he was one of the nation’s best freshman players in 2024 (Jerry Rice Award finalist), and last year won the award for being the best defender in FCS. In 26 games played, Zock shredded the competition with 84 tackles (45 solo, 34.5 for loss, 18.5 sacks) with 6 pass breakups and 4 fumbles forced.
S, Armorion Smith — The rare, new MAC player after earning starts at a Big Ten school. Smith began his college career at Cincinnati (2021-22) before going to Michigan State (2023-25). He made seven starts last year and was the defense’s #6 tackler (35 total, 21 solo, 0.5 TFL) who also had a fumble and an interception.
