The danger of making a good coaching hire at a non-Power Five college is that your hire may not last for the length of his contract. If the successes pile up, you may soon see a bigger school with better resources come and hire him away. Just last year, the American Conference saw three of its coaches leave for Power Five jobs: Houston's Tom Herman to Texas, Temple's Matt Rhule to Baylor and USF's Willie Taggart to Oregon. The year before, it was Memphis' Justin Fuente heading east to Virginia Tech.
This concern may be something to watch at SMU this season.