Michigan Football Position Coach Database
A number of times I have had questions about who coached what position at Michigan, and I have seen others on here with similar questions. Because of that, I have put together the beginnings of a spreadsheet giving a year by year look at who coached various position groups. I say beginnings because there are a number of blank spots, and I haven't even attempted to figure out who coached what before 1969. My hope is that this can be improved on by others and potentially, even added to the site (e.g. similar to the editable depth chart) if the format works, and it's deemed worthy. Here is a link to the google doc:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0Ah4hPti-nM56dDdjclJzR1RVOV9RdXUxeE1iWHhZZEE&usp=sharing
I have gathered this information from MGoBlue.com, Wikipedia, Rivals, various coaches' profile pages, and old media guides. There is also this somewhat helpful resource on MGoBlue that lists the coaches year by year, but fails to finish the job by including their respective positions.
A Note on Formatting
This process got a little dicey when it came to the offensive line, defensive line, and linebackers. Often the coaching responsibilities for the various parts of these positions are divided. In some cases, I found two coaches listed for the same position, but no indication of who coached what portion of that position. Because more information is needed, I listed both coaches at both positions with a "/" between them. For example, in 1991 both Offensive Tackles and Interior Offensive Line are listed with Les Miles/Jerry Hanlon.
In other cases, I found evidence that a coach was only in charge of one aspect of a position. For example, Bob Chmiel coached the Inside Linebackers from 1981-84, but I never found anything about who coached the Outside Linebackers from that time.
Finally, if a coach was listed as the "linebackers coach" I put his name in both categories.
The Special Teams coach can get really confusing. For 2006, I found evidence that the position was handled by at least three different coaches. Until there is better information, I have elected to leave that blank. However, this might be more common than I realize, and maybe that position should also be broken up into more distinct categories.
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I was hoping for a few anecdotes to add here, but everything I came across was pretty straight forward. The most interesting thing I found was how in years gone by it seemed more common for coaches to switch from one side of the ball to the other. Gary Moeller is a prime example.
He came with Bo in 1969 and coached the defensive ends. He then moved up to defensive coordinator in 1973 before becoming the head coach at Illinois. He came back to Michigan in 1980 as the quarterbacks coach, and then again became the defensive coordinator in 1982. After five seasons in that position, he moved back to the offensive side of the ball as coordinator for three seasons, and from what I understand, retained that position even after he became head coach in 1990.
I think like players, coaches have become more specialized over the years. We would probably all be shocked if Mattison retired, and Borges was named the new defensive coordinator. I suspect that the further back you go, coaches stuck to one side of the ball less often, and the lines become more blurred between who coached what position.
I welcome all updates, additions, or corrections to this file.
I can give you a very big hand with all of the older ones you're missing.
Back in the old old days, the most information you could find on coaching staff other than just being a "assistant" or what they called first assistant, second assistant etc. is freshman team coaches.
It wasn't until the 1940s that you could find info with solid sources on what exactly each member of the coaching staff did.
All the information in the tables below was complied by myself while I was creating my Michigan Football book of information that I completed (after six years of long, hard work)-
My main source is Bentley Historical Library with Wikipedia cleaning up some of the things Bentley had missing including a very noteworthy 1901 assistant named Bennie Owen whom Oklahoma's football field is named after. He is their Yost.
William McCauley |
Assistant |
1896 |
James Baird |
Assistant |
1897-1898 |
John R. Duffy |
Assistant |
1897-1899 |
Ignatius M. Duffy |
Assistant |
1897 |
Thaddeus S. Farnham |
Assistant |
1897 |
Raynor S. Freund |
Assistant |
1897 |
Frederick W. Henninger |
Assistant |
1897-1899 |
William C. Malley |
Assistant |
1897-1898 |
Giovanni R. Villa |
Assistant |
1897-1898 |
Archibald Stevenson |
Assistant |
1897 |
Forrest M. Hall |
Assistant |
1898 |
Harry G. Hadden |
Assistant |
1899 |
Bennie Owen |
Assistant |
1901 |
Howard Richardson |
Freshmen |
1902 |
Dan McGugin |
Assistant |
1903 |
William C. Cole |
Assistant |
1904, 1913-1914 |
Lehigh C. Turner |
Freshmen |
1905 |
Curtis G. Redden |
Assistant |
1908-1909, 1911-1912 |
Neil Snow |
Assistant |
1908 |
Clayton Teetzel |
Assistant |
1908 |
Roy Beechler |
Assistant |
1909 |
Albert R. Chandler |
Assistant |
1909 |
Prentiss Douglass |
General Assistant |
1909-1910, 1912-1920 |
Forrest M. Hall |
Assistant |
1909 |
Paul Magoffin |
Assistant |
1909 |
Dave Allerdice |
Assistant |
1910 |
Adolph “Germany” Schulz |
Chief Assistant |
1910, 1913-1915 |
Andrew Smith |
Assistant |
1911-1912 |
Henry Schulte |
Assistant |
1912 |
Ernest Allmendinger |
Second Assistant |
1915, 1919 |
Ralph McGinnis |
Third Assistant |
1915 |
James Raynsford |
Assistant |
1915 |
Miller Pontius |
Assistant |
1916 |
Robert Watson |
Assistant |
1917, 1920 |
Carl Lundgren |
Assistant |
1919 |
Edwin Mather |
Assistant |
1919-1927 |
A.J. Sturznegger |
Assistant |
1920-1923 |
Derril Pratt |
Assistant |
1920 |
Angus Goetz |
Assistant |
1921 |
Elton “Tad” Wieman |
Line |
1921-1926 |
Ray Fisher |
Assistant |
1921-1928, 1930, 1932-1936, 1943-1945 |
Ernie Vick |
Assistant |
1922 |
George Little |
Assistant |
1922 |
Jack Blott |
Head Line |
1924-1933, 1946-1958 |
Harvey Emery |
Assistant |
1924, 1926 |
Frank Hayes |
Assistant |
1924 |
Franklin Cappon |
Assistant |
1925, 1928-1937 |
Harry Kipke |
Assistant |
1925-1928 |
Judson Hyames |
Assistant |
1926 |
Cliff Keen |
Assistant |
1926-1930, 1932-1936, 1941-1958 |
William Louisell |
Assistant |
1926 |
George Veenker |
Assistant |
1926-1930 |
Robert J. Brown |
Assistant |
1927-1928 |
Ray Courtwright |
Assistant |
1927-1930, 1932-1936 |
William Flora |
Assistant |
1927-1928 |
Jack Lovette |
Assistant |
1927 |
James Miller |
Assistant |
1928 |
Bennie Oosterbaan |
Backfield |
1928-1947 |
B.P. Traynor |
Assistant |
1928 |
Fielding Yost |
Assistant |
1928 |
Allan Bovard |
Assistant |
1930 |
Wally Weber |
Freshmen |
1930-1958 |
Jack Heston |
Assistant |
1934 |
William Borgmann |
Assistant |
1935 |
Carl Savage |
Assistant |
1935 |
Francis Wistert |
Assistant |
1936 |
Heartley Anderson |
Assistant |
1937 |
Campbell Dickson |
Assistant |
1938-1939 |
Earl Martineau |
Assistant |
1938-1945 |
Clarence Munn |
Assistant |
1938-1945 |
Ernest McCoy |
Chief Scout |
1940-1942, 1945-1952 |
Archie Kodros |
Assistant |
1940-1941 |
Hercules Renda |
Assistant |
1940-1941 |
William Barclay |
Assistant |
1943-1945 |
Arthur Valpey |
Ends |
1943-1947 |
Forrest Jordan |
Assistant Line |
1946-1947 |
George Ceithaml |
Assistant |
1947-1952 |
Bill Orwig |
Ends |
1948-1951 |
Don Robinson |
Backfield |
1948-1956 |
J.T. White |
Assistant Line |
1948-1954 |
Matt Patanelli |
Ends |
1953-1958 |
Don Dufek, Sr. |
Associate Head Coach |
1954-1965 |
Bob Holloway |
Line |
1954-1965 |
Pete Kinyon |
Assistant |
1954-1956 |
Chalmers “Bump” Elliott |
Backfield |
1957-1958 |
Henry Fonde |
Backfield |
1959-1968 |
Jack Fouts |
Line |
1959-1963 |
Jack Nelson |
Ends |
1959-1965 |
Dennis Fitzgerald |
Quarterbacks |
1963-1968 |
Tony Mason |
Defensive Line |
1964-1968 |
Donald James |
Defensive Coordinator |
1966-1967 |
George Mans |
Offensive Line |
1966-1973 |
Y.C. McNease |
Assistant |
1966-1967 |
William Dodd |
Freshmen Coach |
1966-1968 |
Frank Maloney |
Tight Ends |
1968-1973 |
Robert Shaw |
Receivers |
1968 |
That's amazing! Thanks, I appreciate you sharing it.
And I say this with despite how much I appreciate all the history you've provided and everything else. But dude, try to find a publisher for all this stuff (to go along with all the other stuff and information you seem to have at on hand already). Find a way to sort it out, chapter it, bunch it together, etc. It's Michigan football, if it's done any semblance of well people will buy it. Maybe get someone from Bentley or something to co-author, help with formatting, or whatever else.
But you've clearly spent a ton of time sorting through a ton of history and a bunch of other things with regards to Michigan football. You clearly enjoy it. Turn that enjoyment into a bit of profit or at least something to show for it. You'll probably say you do it for the enjoyment and not for other reasons, but there's something to be said about maximizing the output of your work. A book like this would be an easy and nice source of this sort of information and would at least provide a little something extra for your efforts, even if it isn't much, or even if it isn't a huge financial insentive. It'd be something, in my opinion, to really show for your efforts.
Just an opinion, you can take it FWIW.
Thanks for pointing that.
OLBs were coached by the late Milan (Milo) Vooletich in 1983 and 84. He may have coached the position prior to that and/or after 84, but I know he was there during those 2 years.
Good info, and it is a lot of work.
I started a website a year ago with coaching data (and other stuff, fergodsakes.com. Check out the "M Coaching Trees" section. Didn't do much with the website in the off-season, but will be doing quite a bit during the season.
Great resource, thanks for sharing!
Oh, Bruce Tall...
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