Brent Munger Brennan's ancestry can be traced to prominent 1700s American patriot Salmon Munger, who is buried in the eponymous Munger Cemetery in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.
Centuries later, Brent Brennan knows what it's like to be buried (in a football sense).
In his first year as a football coach, an assistant on the 1996 Woodside High School team a short drive from the Stanford University campus, Brennan's Wildcats — sound familiar? — were eliminated from the playoffs 46-0 by rival Leland High School. A post-game brawl ensued. Two Wildcats were arrested for assault and battery. Woodside was banned from the playoffs for two years.
Little did Brennan know that would become the pattern for his coaching career: get buried, dig out, find success.
A year after the debacle at Woodside, in his first college coaching job, at Hawaii, Brennan's Rainbows went 0-12. Yes, 0-12.
Two years later, coaching under Dick Tomey at Arizona, the Wildcats went 5-6, and Tomey was dismissed from the program. So was Brennan.
Arizona head coach Brent Brennan exhorts his defense to hold with Oklahoma State trying to convert from inside their own five during the third quarter, Oct. 4, 2025, in Tucson.
As a first-year assistant at San Jose State in 2005, Brennan's Spartans went 3-8.
As a first-year assistant at Oregon State in 2011, the Beavers fell flat, going 3-9.
In Brennan's first year as a head coach at San Jose State, 2017, the dismal Spartans went 2-11
The pattern continued in Brennan's first season as Arizona's head coach, 2024, when the Wildcats went 4-8. The hot seat was cooking.
But rather than remaining buried in a football grave, Brennan has always risen to life when least expected.
The 3-8 SJSU Spartans of 2005 went 9-4 the next season.
The 3-9 OSU Beavers of 2011 also went 9-4 the next season.
The dreadful 2-11 San Jose State team of 2017 would come to life with back-to-back seasons of 7-5 and 7-1 (COVID year). The Spartans rewrote Brennan's contract a day before Christmas, 2020.
"I want to be here the next 15 years," he proclaimed.
Arizona head coach Brent Brennan goes down the line of fans for high fives after the Wildcats held on to edge Kansas 24-20, Nov. 8, 2025, at Arizona Stadium.
That's not something you'd ever hear from his UA predecessor, Jedd Fisch, a noted job-hopper now working his 14th job since 2000. When Fisch hopped from Arizona to Washington in January 2024, Brennan broke down and wept when he was offered and accepted Arizona's coaching vacancy, ending his "15 year" extension at SJSU after three years. It was bittersweet times two.
Brennan's tears were a combination of joy and sadness. Sort of like his coaching odyssey. He knows both sides as well as any coach in the business.
In our 30th annual list of Tucson's Top 100 Sports Figures of the Year, Brennan's totally unexpected makeover of the Arizona football program earns him the No. 1 spot, a role that has been occupied since 1995 by, among others, Lute Olson, Mike Candrea and Frank Busch.
Few could have predicted Brennan rising through the coaching ranks to Arizona's current spot at No. 18 in the AP poll, beating rival ASU to finish the regular season 9-3 and earning a spot in the Jan. 2 Holiday Bowl.
As a walk-on wide receiver at UCLA in the mid-1990s, Brennan caught one pass in four seasons. Yes, one. He had been an all-league football player at St. Francis High School, a short drive from Stanford, but chose to return to his family's home turf in SoCal for college. His father, Steve, had been an all-star receiver for powerhouse Mater Dei High School in the late 1960s and in a way, Brennan has become the spitting image of his father, a former executive in the Machinist Workers Union Pension Fund, among other things.
Arizona head football coach Brent Brennan hugs Wilbur ahead of the UA men's basketball game against Auburn at McKale Center, Dec. 6, 2025.
Steve Brennan, who died of cancer in 2014 at age 66, was known as a "giver," a people person who was a visible contributor to the Ronald McDonald House for three decades. Brent is also a people person, nicest guy in the room, who has drawn criticism for, of all things, being too nice.
Not exactly the next Rich Rodriguez or Sean Miller.
It's not about Brent, it's about the team. He has restored Tomey's legacy of "the team, the team, the team."
At a press conference to announce his contract extension at San Jose State five years ago, a reporter asked Brennan to "describe himself in 45 seconds."
Ever modest, Brennan said, "Me, in 45 seconds? I'm probably only worth 10."
The man who hired Brennan at San Jose State in 2017, giving him his first head coaching opportunity, was athletic director Gene Bleymaier.
"I reviewed 75 candidates for the job," said Bleymaier. "Brent was just what we wanted. He's someone who connects with his players and the community. That's what we need."
Arizona head coach Brent Brennan and linebacker Jabari Mann (11) celebrate the Wildcats forcing a turnover on downs from Baylor during the fourth quarter of their Big 12 game, Nov. 22, 2025, in Tucson.
At San Jose State, Brennan had back-to-back winning seasons in 2022-23, the first time a SJSU coach had done so in 32 years. Over that period, the Spartans had employed eight coaches. None could crack the code, even though former Stanford head coaches John Ralston and Jack Elway gave it a shot. Brennan cracked the code and won.
So maybe it's not a shocker that he improved Arizona's record from 4-8 to 9-3 in one season, a five-game improvement that has only been matched at the UA by Fisch (2022-2023) and Darrell Mudra (1967-68).
Brennan has learned under elite coaches such as Tomey, UCLA's Terry Donahue, Washington's Rick Neuheisel and Oregon State's Mike Riley. He spent four years at Cal-Poly under Tucsonan Rich Ellerson, one of the top defensive coaches of the last 50 years. That's a résumé as impressive as one could hope.
Now Brennan has his own impressive résumé, a program builder, the type of man you trust coaching your son or anyone.
