One-on-One With Tennessee Tech's Bobby Wilder

in new Tennessee Tech head coach Bobby Wilder coach glad to see you you're decked out uh I tell you what Mark Wilson's coached you up just right hey gotta make a presentation when you get in front of the camera alrighty doc Dr Olden will appreciate that too first of all welcome to the league and and thank you I mean you're a you're a known face in college football football circles particularly in FCS but let's start way up in the northeastern United States in Maine and work our way down to the uh to the Virginia Hampton Roads area and then work our way west to Cookville take us through that Journey yeah sounds good born and raised in a small town called Madison Maine my parents still live there um I'll Circle back to this the majority of my family has migrated to the Nashville area so I'm actually home now Cookville is is home my family's here um but played uh college football at the University of Maine Captain quarterback all-time leading passer when I graduated went on to Boston College where I worked for Jack mcnell for two years earned my Master's Degree and then back to the University of Maine was actually hired back by Kirk frence his first head coaching job Kirk's now the head coach at Iowa longest tenure coach in America one of the best in the business and started my coaching career there spent 17 years worked my way up to associate head coach offensive coordinator quarterback coach and then in 2007 was hired at Old Dominion to uh help start a football program they hadn't played since um back in the 40s it was a 69e absence we we spent 26 months building facilities hiring coaches recruiting players and then we just hit the ground running in 2009 we were -2 followed it up with eight and3 10 and three 11-2 playoffs we were 38- 10 the first four years and then we made the decision to trans transition up to FBS and Conference USA we had some good success there 2016 we went 10 and three and one the Bahamas bowl and then we really started to over schedu we started to play a lot of power five teams and non-league games and didn't win enough the last couple years they asked me to leave and then um was was interviewing for jobs doing some private covid hits some things got a little challenging in in the coaching world and then I got a call back in uh November about this job and interest level and Mark Wilson and I are both from Maine we're both University of Maine graduates he was he was behind me a few years but we'd followed each other's careers and I wasn't sure being perfectly honest if this was a job I was going to take I'd done my research on the program uh the struggles they'd had recently and then when I met with president oldum and Mark and I had a very detailed presentation on what we had done at Old Dominion how we had built the best startup program in the history of college football and what it would take and uh they were all in with the plan and that led to my hiring I've been here eight months and absolutely living the dream and also coinciding with that a couple things you've got a building program going on at Tennessee Tech at this very moment how does that miror what you did at ODU yeah that that's great uh question by you the analog the the the similari is very very interesting um a very Progressive president in terms of um growth student population you know if you look around the country most four-year institutions are losing population we're growing at Tennessee Tech and his vision president olden's vision is to continue to grow we've got nine different projects going on on campus with the stadium being one of them so how do you go about putting together the staff it's now early December and Bobby Wilder's the head football coach at Tennessee tag take us from there to July yeah the first um over let me step back a little bit over the last couple years I had stayed in touch with people that I knew I wanted to hire when this next opportunity came along so the staff was in place in my head it was just a matter of getting it on paper tremendous support from president old and Mark Wilson with hiring staff we've also not only do we have our our full um staff members assistance we also added a general manager director player Personnel to handle recruiting we added a strength coach just for football which is not always common at the FCS level so the staff came together quickly I wanted to keep uh members of the defensive Staff last year they were number one in the league in five different categories defensively really good system in place who was able to keep some members from last year and then brought in the majority of the offensive staff or coaches I had worked with at Old Dominion that after we separated everybody went their separate way picked up the phone and called them let's get the gang back together they packed moved to Cookville so that was really important to get the staff together of not only guys that I'd worked with had experience in the system offensively that I wanted to run but to keep the structure that 425 structure on defense that was so good for Tech last year how do you think that equates to this conference that 425 alignment it's it's basically a microcosm of col football a lot of what you see in college football right now is really fast break basketball on a football field so you've got to match Personnel the majority of the Personnel groupings are 10 and 11 personnel there's a lot of speed on the field so by putting an extra defensive back on the field it helps you to match that speed that you're seeing from offenses did you bring your own uh evaluation process in with the existing team that you inherited and then the changes you have made how did you go about that you said you got the gang all back together for the most part so there had to be some evaluation process as kind of a blueprint of your own going into it speak to that a bit if you would yeah really really good question it it goes back first and foremost to um something I've had developed as a head coach called the aim high philosophy so anytime we evaluate any of the players we had inherited from last year's team which coach Alexander and his staff had there's some good football players on this team they had some good talent on this team um and then the new players we bring in it always goes back to the aim high philosophy so first thing we do is evaluate them as people their family their background number two academically can they have success at at a school like Tennessee Tech the number two public institution in Tennessee and then number three what value do they bring as a football player very detailed specifically by position to fit the systems that were running offense defense and special team and it was easy to put that in place because we'd had it and developed it and the coaches I had were teaching the new guys about it and then as I mentioned to you we hired that general manager position which was critical when you're when you're looking at something that's that's a very major part of college football right now the transfer portal you have to have an availability as a staff to evaluate what can get to about 15,000 players in that portal so what are you looking for specifically and I'll give you an example offensive lineman we wanted players that were at least 64 or taller in the offensive l in the offensive line so the Matrix we had with the software we use we were able to break down the roughly 2,000 offensive linemen that were in the portal and identify all the players that were 64 plus and then I identify who are the players that would be available for Tennessee Tech because obviously the University of Tennessee and the big boys are going to take who they want and then the group of five is going to take who they want okay then how can we break that down to specifically find the 6 fo4 Plus offensive lineman that would be available to us so aim high philosophy a matrix and then a way to evaluate not only the portal but the high school players I guess Nate hodnet fils that bill on the offensive line for you yeah he he's pretty special he he's a really interesting story when I first got here he was he was done he had said I'm not coming back I'm I'm not playing he had graduated very very successful young man he's going to be he's going to be a success in whatever he does in life and I called him and brought him into the office and said hey let me just share with you what's going to happen here let me share the vision the plan see what you think and long story short he we got him enrolled into grad school so now he could get his Masters which obviously he could see the value in that uh and then to have him back as the anchor of the offensive line that was that was probably early on my top recruit was getting him to come back and that's often the case in this era of Transport portals is you got to reclaim it seems in this instance reclaim your roster year over year also today I just wanted to talk a little bit about Daniel Rickard on the defensive side on the line and also in all this evaluation all this funneling down of potentials how do you build build it from there coach and by that I mean you going to go inside out or outside in and a word or two about Daniel Rickard sure yeah Daniel Rickards was clearly one of the best players in the league last year 10 sacks um 15 tfls his defensive line coach Sam Williamson's one of the best in the country did an excellent job rotating eight defensive linemen so Dan played 330 snaps last year that's that's about 30 snaps a game he was fresh he was aggressive he was explosive so managed really well and then just an outstanding instinctive football player those are powerful numbers for a d Liam 10 sacks 15 tfls uh that's really big those are game-changing numbers having him back was impactful to your question about how to build it um you always start with the quarterback because that's the most vital position and then the center and then you work your way out in terms of what you need defensively I've always been a very strong proponent of it starts with your defensive line and the reason being your defensive line can impact the game in so many ways whether it's stopping the run or putting enough pressure on the quarterback that the routes on are allowed to develop down the field so major emphasis defensively with the defensive line working back and then with the quarterback Center working out your impressions and there's a reason why you here coach but your impressions of Cookville in the Upper Cumberland in the short period of time you live there you mentioned your family your colleagues that join you again there's got to be something that really uh beyond that initial meeting with Dr oldum and Mark Wilson that really said hey this is the place I want to be yeah one one of the first things I did on the visit was uh Amy new who's the president of our Chamber of Commerce took me on a tour took me around Cookville and I I'd done my homework i' done my research on you know Cookville is about 35,000 putham C's about 75,000 and and the growth at Nashville sprawl that started back around Co and the area is multiplying 2% per year so for someone who's been around at a minute like I have seeing that this is an area that's growing it's not an area that's dying it's an area that's expanding and uh really impressed and just the welcome I felt it felt a lot to me like um growing up in Maine and and working at the University of Maine living in Bangor in terms of the people uh what I love about the south as you know it's Faith Family football until you get to Saturday then football's number one and take you pick what's two and three um love that part of it the excitement with it this this is home to me this is where I can see myself um I spent 17 years at the University of Maine 13 at Old the minion so I'm not a I'm not a coach that travels if I like where my feet are that's where my feet stay and this feels like home glad to have you in the conference glad to have you in Cookville wishing you all the best this season Bobby Wilder the new head coach at tenk great to be with you wings up