Very few people who closely follow college football actually believe that West Virginia’s first-year Defensive Coordinator Zac Alley was on the verge of career failure following his first campaign sharing the same title during Oklahoma’s disappointing debut season in the SEC. But Alley’s bold move this off-season to take the outright DC gig in Morgantown might have saved his career anyway.
Alley’s decision to leave Oklahoma came as a shock to many at the time in college football, as they did not predict he would leave a program where he was expected to one day inherit full defensive control from his mentor and head coach. Even moreso, a move from an SEC program with prior national championships to a Big 12 program with no championships isn’t exactly common.
Alley’s defense excelled despite Oklahoma’s 6-7 overall record, which included a 2-6 conference record and a 13th-place finish in the SEC. Defensively, the Sooners finished the season 31st in FBS in total defense and No. 5th in the SEC in the same category. That might be why he’s officially the first coordinator to earn a $1 million or more contract in WVU history.
The Mountaineers inked Alley to a four-year deal that pays him a cool 1.5 million annually (with performance-based incentives also peppered throughout the contract) to reunite with WVU Head Coach Rich Rodriguez after their first stint together at Jacksonville State. It's a significant pay raise from Oklahoma, and there is no doubt it likely played a role in Alley’s decision.
But there are other reasons for the move that make quite a bit of sense when explored with more detail -- and that might end up making the initially risky move the best career choice Alley could have made.
The SEC Pressures and The Reset Button
Despite Alley’s stout defenses last season, all was not well in Norman. The aforementioned lackluster performance for a team accustomed to College Football Playoff appearances and a championship pedigree stings for the administration and fanbase at Oklahoma, especially in their first-year in the SEC, where the competition is a bit more stiff but the Sooners hoped to show that they still belong at the adult table in college football.
Head Coach Brent Venables -- Alley’s mentor from their time together winning national championships with Dabo Swinney at Clemson -- was not fired for the on-field results, but it’s also not his first less-than-stellar season since taking over the program in a similar prodigal son role as Rodriguez at WVU. A 10-win 2023 season bought him time, but another rough season could send Venables packing along with the rest of his staff. If Alley had stayed and things went South, that would include him.
There’s a bit of a concept of a reset button in college football, where you leave a job before you earn a pink slip or a retirement request from the administration when things have been going poorly, or feel stagnant. Chip Kelly from UCLA Head Coach to Ohio State Offensive Coordinator is a recent example, which catapulted Kelly to a NFL gig and a CFP National Championship in just 12 months.
Sometimes you get out while the getting is good. And while that might not entirely be the case here, it never hurts to reset your career a bit when things outside your control risk your job security becoming unstable.
Full Control of Play Calling and Staff
Venables is known as a defensive guru -- a career DC before taking his current job, he takes a hands-on approach to his team’s defense.
Alley was not the sole DC at Oklahoma, and it's very likely Venables had his hands on the defense at the least, with other names potentially flaunting some power as well. At WVU, Alley will find himself the sole man occupying his role as Defensive Coordinator -- there’s no doubt he’ll be the man in control of the scheme and the play calls. He also gets to surround himself with a staff he likely has a ton of weight in choosing.
He brings in familiar faces like Nickel/Sam Coach Henry Weinreich, whose followed him from Jacksonville State to Oklahoma to WVU, and Defensive Assistant Andrew Warwick, who comes to Morgantown from his role as co-Defensive Coordinator at FCS program Wofford but cut his teeth as a staffer at Clemson alongside Alley under Venables. Other Alley disciples include Defensive Line Coach William Green and Special Teams Coordinator and Defensive Assistant Pat Kirkland.
A Future Head Start As a Head Coach
Rich Rodriguez is in his 60s -- he likely won’t want to coach too long into retirement age, considering his already lengthy career -- and signed just a three-year deal with WVU (one less than Alley, interestingly) to start his tenure.
That’s not to say Rodriguez won’t stick around for an extension if things go well, but he also doesn’t fit the mold for a 10+ year hire. Plus, despite his promises to stay until he’s finished with his career, the Power 2 conferences might come calling again if he once again works magic in Morgantown, and that’s hard to resist.
But Alley likely has aspirations to eventually lead a program, is young as all get out, and would have experience in a winning program at WVU if a time comes where Rodriguez steps away following a period of success -- and the Mountaineers did officially bestow upon him the title of Assistant Head Coach as well as Defensive Coordinator, demonstrating his hierarchy in the new regime.
The allure of having a head start at a Power 4 program that could provide winnable opportunities and serve as a springboard to the Big 10, SEC, or NFL might be weighing on Alley’s mind as well, and WVU would be hard-pressed to pass up a built-in head coach who knows the program and may eventually be among the top candidates in the sport.