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Jon Sumrall does not like Trent Dilfer. Not only are the coaches rivals on the field with their teams each competing in the American Conference, but they have a well-documented online beef, too.
Sumrall has thrown major digs Dilfer’s way. Many go after the coach’s bank account. He did it again ahead of the league’s media day event.
We’ll backtrack a bit to set the scene.
Trent Dilfer arrived at UAB in 2023, the program’s first year in the AAC. He’s gone 7-17 across two seasons, seeing a regression in Year 2.
Jon Sumrall took over a year later in 2024 with Tulane. His squad went 9-5 last year while playing for a league title.
The two programs are in very different spots. The Green Wave annihilated the Blazers in their most recent meeting, 71-20. It was 71-6 before a pair of late UAB touchdowns.
Despite the massive disadvantage, Dilfer opted to take a pair of timeouts as Tulane ran the final seconds from the clock. He then got extremely handsy with Sumrall during a tense postgame handshake.
Jon Sumrall is not a fan of Trent Dilfer!
The coach was visibly peeved by the late timeouts from UAB last year. It showed in the postgame interaction. Those feelings of disdain only continued through the offseason.
In January, Dilfer cryptically called out Tulane for shady recruiting tactics.
“We have two teams [in our league] that will go to our roster and sign double or triple what these guys can make on our roster and make them backups on their roster so that we can’t have them.
-Trent Dilfer
Days later, Sumrall publicly mocked his counterpart over a report that stated UAB had been operating in the very same way.
Dilfer cried poor only to get exposed. That back and forth resurfaced this summer thanks to Sumrall.
Sumrall mocked UAB from his private jet.
Both teams geared up for American Conference media days, posting travel arrangements to build hype. The Blazers were first, tweeting a photo of a helmet on an airport desk ahead of a 9:30 am commercial flight.
Sumrall responded by resharing that image alongside a caption that read, “First class?” He then added a picture of his team flying private.
First class? https://t.co/IsWF3zVgVc pic.twitter.com/PlbVZrXqMn
— Jon Sumrall (@CoachJonSumrall) July 24, 2025
Tulane has money. Jon Sumrall’s not afraid to flaunt it, at least not if comes with an opportunity to rib Trent Dilfer.
American media days will wrap up on Friday. Unfortunately, Tulane and UAB won’t face off on the football field this fall barring the longshot chance both squads wind up in the conference championship.
Still, we can expect the two coaches to square off at some point on social media given their history.