5 candidates to replace Jake Dickert as WSU Cougars football coach

Dec 19, 2024, 1:17 PM | Updated: 1:30 pm

Montana State Bobcats head coach Brent Vigen watches during a 2022 game. (Amanda Loman/Getty Images)

(Amanda Loman/Getty Images)

BY ZAC HERETH

Seattle Sports

The WSU Cougars were already set for major changes to their coaching staff, but those changes have become even greater.

Former WSU Cougars coach Dickert embraces Wake Forest’s stability

Head coach Jake Dickert left the program Wednesday to take the same role at Wake Forest in the ACC. The Cougs previously had holes to fill at offensive and defensive coordinator on their coaching staff. Head coach now tops the list.

With a vacancy left at the top of WSU’s coaching ladder, here’s a look at five potential candidates to fill it.

Five candidates for WSU Cougars coach

• Brent Vigen: Vigen is thought of as a top candidate for the Cougars’ open position after helping Montana State continue its ascension to becoming an FCS powerhouse in the rugged Big Sky Conference. In four years under Vigen, the Bobcats have won at least 12 games three times and reached the playoffs in each season. He took Montana State to the title game in 2021, the semifinals in 2023 and has his eyes on a national title this year. The top-ranked Bobcats are 14-0 and face fourth-ranked South Dakota in the semifinals Saturday. He’s 46-9 in his four seasons with the program.

Vigen coached alongside Dickert at Wyoming for three seasons and spent seven total seasons with the Cowboys as a quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator, including three seasons as an associate head coach, so a Dickert-to-Vigen transition could be a smooth one. Vigen was a tight end at North Dakota State and began coaching at his alma mater immediately after his playing career, spending 16 seasons on the staff in various roles as an offensive assistant.

• Kirby Moore: Moore has some of the strongest local ties of potential candidates for the Cougars. The former Prosser High School standout won a Class 2A state champion as a junior in 2007 alongside his brother Kellen Moore, who is now the offensive coordinator for the Philadelphia Eagles. Kirby Moore has spent the past two seasons as the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Missouri in the powerhouse SEC. After his first season with the Tigers, he signed a contract extension through the 2025 season and is set to make $1.3 million in 2025.

Moore played for Chris Petersen at Boise State and spent two years under his former coach as a graduate assistant at UW during the 2015 and 2016 seasons. He then spent six years as Fresno State serving as wide receivers coach, passing game coordinator, quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator. Moore coached under former Cal coach Jeff Tedford and former UW coach Kalen DeBoer during his years as Fresno State. When he became Fresno State’s offensive coordinator in 2022 following DeBoer’s departure, he took over a role previously manned by current Seattle Seahawks offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb.

• Jim Mora Jr.: The former Seattle Seahawks and Atlanta Falcons head coach has had a somewhat tumultuous career, but he’s in the midst of a solid three-year run in one of the FBS level’s toughest gigs at UConn, which is one of just three independent schools at college football’s highest level. The Huskies won only one game in 2021 before Mora took over the helm and led them to six wins and a bowl game in 2022. UConn is playing in a bowl once again this season after posting an eight-win season, the program’s most wins since 2010. The son of former longtime NFL coach Jim Mora Sr., he spent six seasons as the head coach at UCLA from 2012-17 and helped the Bruins reach four bowl games and the 2012 Pac-12 Conference title game. In nine total college seasons, he holds a 63-50 record. The younger Mora held various coaching jobs in the NFL from 1985-2009, including three seasons as the head coach of the Falcons (2004-06) and one as the head coach of the Seahawks (2009).

• Eric Morris: Morris has already made two stops at WSU, including as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach in 2022 before landing the head coaching gig at North Texas. Morris last joined WSU after four seasons as the head coach at Incarnate Word and was instrumental in bringing quarterback Cam Ward to the Palouse. Morris was also a wide receivers coach at WSU in 2012 under Mike Leach, who he played for at Texas Tech. In his two seasons leading North Texas, Morris holds a 11-13 record, and he has the Mean Green in a bowl game this year after a 6-6 regular season. Morris’ other college coaching stops include two years as a graduate assistant at Houston and five seasons as an offensive coordinator and receivers coach at Texas Tech.

• Jeff Choate: Choate is a former WSU assistant coach who just finished up his first season as a head coach at the FBS level with Nevada. Choate led the Wolfpack to a 3-10 season, which included an 0-7 mark in the Mountain West, after taking over a program that was coming off back-to-back two-win seasons. He spent the four prior seasons as the co-defensive coordinator and linebackers coach at Texas, helping the Longhorns reach the College Football Playoff semifinal in while ranking first in the Big 12 in scoring and rushing defense in 2023. Choate landed an assistant role with Texas following a successful four-year stint with Montana State. The Bobcats won four and five games, respectfully, in first two seasons before making back-to-back trips to the FCS playoffs, culminating in a run to the semifinals in 2019.

Choate has plenty of experience coaching the Pacific Northwest. He spent time coaching special teams, linebackers and running backs during six seasons on Petersen’s staff at Boise State from 2006-11, was a linebackers coach under Leach at WSU in 2012, and spent another two years under Petersen leading the defensive line and special teams for the UW Huskies during the 2014 and 2015 seasons. A Montana Western alum, Choate has also spent time as an assistant at Utah State, Eastern Illinois and Florida.

Roth on WSU coaching search

College football analyst and former Pac-12 Network host Yogi Roth joined Seattle Sports’ Bump and Stacy on Thursday and offered the names of some more under-the-radar candidates he thinks WSU could pursue.

“I would be calling people like (offensive coordinator) Marcus Arroyo at Arizona State. I think he’d thrive. He’s up for the Broyles Award (best college assistant coach) right now,” Roth said. “You look at what (offensive coordinator) Brennan Carroll has done at UW. I know they’ve been down this year, but everyone knew they’d be rebuilding. He’s interviewed for jobs in the Mountain West in the past.

“I look at Andy Kotelnicki, the offensive coordinator at Penn State who interviewed for West Virginia. Sounds like he’s going to come on back if they play in a playoff game, but he comes from that Kalen DeBoer school to a certain degree of he mowed the lawn and called plays for a small school all the way up to Kansas and a bunch of stops in between.”

While it’s been a tough go of late for the WSU football program, Roth still views the coaching job as a desirable one.

“I think it’s a really cool job. I really do. I think it’s got a shot to do what every coach wants to do, which is win and impact and identify and develop,” Roth said. “I do think Wazzu – I’ll say it again – they’re a Power Four program. They just happened to get screwed by a system that put them on the outside looking in. But I think that’s what I’d be telling to my coaches, and I think when this new-look (Pac-12) league finally emerges, they’re going to be like USC was in the old Pac-12. Them and Oregon State and I’d say Boise and maybe San Diego State are going to be the frontrunners every year.”