It’s been a rough few months for the Utah Utes’ coaching staff. As a result, head coach Kyle Whittingham believed the best course of action for his team was to manufacture continuity despite losing multiple coaches to other programs.
Everything started when defensive coordinator Kalani Sitake left to join Gary Anderson’ staff at Oregon State. Sitake was followed by offensive coordinator Dave Christensen, who left to take over as the Texas A&M Aggies’ offensive line coach and run game coordinator.
Then there was rumors that Whittingham interviewed for the opening with the Nebraska Cornhuskers, and the coach wasn’t seeing eye-to-eye with athletic director Chris Hill.
Whittingham eventually received a four-year extension, and he named offensive line coach Jim Harding and quarterbacks coach Aaron Roderick the team’s co-offensive coordinators.
Promotions from within the staff were important to Whittingham after the team experienced numerous changes along its offensive staff in recent years.
“We’re going to continue to move forward with what we’ve been doing,” Whittingham said in an interview on KFAN in Salt Lake City, via CoachingSearch.com. “That’s the first order of business, to make sure our players were able to continue in the same exact scheme we were running last year. They feel very comfortable in that scheme and we didn’t want to make wholesale changes. We expect to continue to go down the road we’re on, fine tune what we’re doing. Even if you don’t change coordinators, you’re going to have tweaks. The basis of the offense and the philosophy of the offense remains the same.”
While Harding and Roderick will be taking over the offense, Whittingham is confident in his entire offensive staff.
“I just felt, between the two of those guys, they bring a lot to the table in their respective areas,” he continued. “I thought it was good working situation. Don’t forget about (running backs/assistant head coach) Dennis Erickson. He’s a major impact and major contributor to what we’re doing offensively. He doesn’t have a coordinator title, but he’s the assistant head coach now. He’s a guy that has a big influence on what we’re doing, offensively.”
