One of the top possible candidates to replace Jay Hill as defensive coordinator at BYU is the man who taught Hill much of what he knows. If this actually happened, it would be like the teacher replacing the student at the head of the class. And the best part in terms of consistency, continuity and convenience is that the master is already sitting in the classroom.
He is currently an advisor to the Cougars.
There are those who say Gary Andersen doesn’t want to play front and center in football anymore, not anymore. He doesn’t want to be any coordinator. He doesn’t want to be a standard coach. He just wants to hang out and be what he is—consultant, advisor, confidant. Yeah, counselor.
He wants to play it now and then, but not as the main character. Been there and done that before. Now he wants to work behind the scenes. He prefers the dark corners of anonymity where he can make a difference without attracting attention without stealing the show.
They don’t just say “you”. Andersen himself says so. He told Scotty and Hans on their radio show Friday that he’s staying at BYU but not trying to be a defensive coordinator.
“It’s a great place for me,” he said. … [You have to ask]: ‘Are you happy, where are you?’ I am 100% happy where I am. I don’t want to do more. I want to be an analyst. I want to help coaches grow. I want to help children grow. I want to be the best grandpa in the country.”
Follow-up question: Couldn’t he have done all those things as the leader of BYU’s defense?
He answered this with a series of different declarative statements which brought up another question.
• “We have good defensive fundamentals.”
• “It’s a special group.”
• “Jay and I were on the same page. … We had a great game plan together. Now it’s the next D coordinator’s turn.”
• “I’ll be around the defense as a whole this year … whatever Kalani wants me to do.”
But…
What if Kalani Sitake wants him at the tip of a spear and runs right through his defense? What if she needs him to do that? What if he closes the door behind Andersen, looks him straight in the eye, one on one, and says, “Brother, I need you to do this. You’re my guy. You’re the one.”
what happens next?
Gary, will you take the man away for $9 million?
who knows It’s a mystery.
Andersen’s unusual career path underscores the last point. He highlights another word: unpredictability. We’ll get to that in a moment.
But it should be said at the outset that Gary Andersen is more qualified to lead BYU’s defense than anyone else inside or arguably outside the program. Far more qualified.
He has been wandering the corridors of Provo for a few years. His name can be found on the football staff directory on BYU’s website, 12th on the staff, just above the names of the assistant assistants, holding what he mentioned is a “senior analyst” position.
If ever there was a more seasoned and savvy running back who humbly toiled behind the scenes of a football program, it’s Andersen now, and in his previous job, doing the exact same thing at Weber State.
Advice. Advice. Knowledge. Present almost everywhere inside, almost invisible outside.
People who have forgotten or were never aware of Andersen’s coaching resume probably aren’t or have never been serious college football watchers. Briefly, that resume, before his last two stops from 2021-present, in reverse order: Utah State head coach (2019-20), Utah associate head coach (2018), Oregon State head coach (2015-17), Wisconsin head coach (2013-14), Utah head coach-coordinator defen12200 (2005-08), defensive line coach of Utah (2004), head coach at Southern Utah (2003), assistant head coach at Utah (2001-03) … and before that, 12 years of coaching.
You may have noticed some oddities in that timeline.
Several long and short stops on the way from nyah-to-nyah, several clutch presses and gear changes that were never fully explained or understood. Andersen left millions of dollars on the table as he worked his way through these gears and jumped from place to place. For example, why did he move from the top dawg in Wisconsin to the top dawg in the state of Oregon, and then from the top dawg in the state of Oregon to an assistant, again in Utah? Why did he suddenly step down from the Utah State helm after just a few games in 2020? Why should he be happy to be a consultant at Weber State, of all places, and then BYU?
Only Andersen knows all the circumstances, all the reasons, whether professional or personal.
Those of us who knew the man as a fierce prospect when he worked for Kyle Whittingham in Utah before first moving to Logan, where he had tremendous success leading the Aggies, including a 12-2 season, have come to know him as the kind of hungry coach who is out to conquer the world. He was paid plenty of money to jump to Madison to contend in the Big Ten before essentially disappearing into the Pac-12 hinterland in Corvallis. After a second stay in Logan, he disappeared again.
what’s going on What was down there? What was all around?
He’s beating me.
But one thing is certain: Andersen knows how to coach and coordinate a defense. One of the guys who studied under him for a while was and is… uh-huh, Jay Hill, who trained with him when they were both in Utah in the first decade of the 2000s. Hill cites Andersen as one of his coaching influences and mentors.
If the mentor wants to be a grandfather, all the best. He is 61 years old.
And since BYU seems to want to keep the defensive momentum in the same vein that already exists, perhaps Sitake will instead call up Jernaro Gilford, who has done such a great job with the Cougars. Or maybe she’ll go with Justin Ena or Kelly Poppinga. If he’s reeling in someone from the outside, he’d best fit in all the comfortable ones without breaking the connection with Andersen, because if there’s a disconnect, if there’s a breach, the problems will follow close behind. Not to mention the wishes and whims of successful athletes who liked the way of defense. They don’t want some supposed genius coming in with a new system they don’t know.
That is, unless Andersen is selected as defensive coordinator, by Sitake’s choice or his own decision, he will have a serious say in who wins the title.
“I want to help BYU football grow,” he said. “… My goal is to help the coaches, to help the athletes. It’s an amazing place for me.”
Almost as amazing as if the counselor actually became the coordinator. But in a career that, for whatever reason, hasn’t always gone as expected, it might make a little too much sense.
Leave a Reply