JANUARY 13, 2024:
Extended version:
JANUARY 12, 2024:
UNDATED (AP)– Alabama is negotiating with Washington coach Kalen DeBoer and is close to hiring him as the replacement for Nick Saban, a person with direct knowledge of the talks said Friday (Jan. 12, 2024).
The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because a deal was not completed yet.
DeBoer, 49, is a former NAIA coach who led Washington to the national championship game in just his second season.
DeBoer would replace Saban, who announced his retirement Wednesday after leading the Crimson Tide to six national championships in 17 seasons.
The fast-rising DeBoer led the Huskies to a 14-1 record that included a Pac-12 championship before losing to No. 1 Michigan 34-13 in the national title game. He was named The Associated Press coach of the year.
DeBoer led the Huskies to a 25-3 record in two seasons after taking over a program that was 4-8 in 2021.
DeBoer led his alma mater Sioux Falls to a 67-3 record from 2005-09 and won three NAIA championships at the small, Baptist-affiliated school in South Dakota’s largest city. He later had immediate success at Fresno State, going 12-6 in two seasons from 2020-21.
At Alabama, he would replace a coach who won a major college record seven national titles, including one at LSU. The Crimson Tide have been in national title contention just about every season since winning their first in 17 seasons back in 2009, Saban’s third year.
Alabama’s short-term expectations won’t change with a team led by quarterback Jalen Milroe and a roster fortified by a string of highly rated recruiting classes.
DeBoer coached Heisman Trophy runner-up Michael Penix Jr. last season and brings an offensive track record to replace Saban, a former NFL defensive coordinator. He was Fresno State’s offensive coordinator in the 2017 and 2018 seasons and held the same job at Indiana for a year before replacing Jeff Tedford.
DeBoer was an All-America receiver at Sioux Falls who helped the Cougars win their first national championship in 1996. He then stayed on as receivers coach, returning in 2000 as offensive coordinator after a stint as a high school coach in Sioux Falls.
JANUARY 2, 2024:
UNDATED – Milbank native Kaleb DeBoer coached the University of Sioux Falls to 3 National NAIA Championships nearly two decades ago. Now the South Dakota native will attempt to win a NCAA FBS Championship at the University of Washington. DeBoer and the Huskies defeated Texas 37-31 last night in the Allstate Sugar Bowl game to set up a championship matchup against Michigan next Monday Night. Michigan defeated Alabama 27-20 in overtime to win the Rose Bowl and second semi final game yesterday (Jan. 1, 2024).
(Story courtesy of Rod Fisher.)
DECEMBER 27, 2023:
SEATTLE (AP) —Washington coach Kalen DeBoer is the pride of South Dakota as the Huskies prepare for their College Football Playoff semifinal against Texas Jan. 1, 2024. DeBoer grew up in the state and was head coach at Sioux Falls when the Cougars won three NAIA championships from 2006-09. DeBoer had six coaching stops in 12 years after leaving Sioux Falls. His head coaching record is 103-11 at the NAIA and NCAA levels. The people who know DeBoer say if there were a Mount Rushmore of football in the Mount Rushmore State, DeBoer would belong up there if Washington wins the national title.
DECEMBER 26, 2023:
SEATTLE (AP) — Kalen DeBoer got called into the athletic director’s office a few days after the University of Sioux Falls won its third national championship in four years.
The 2009 Cougars had just finished one of the most dominating seasons in NAIA history. In Willie Sanchez’s mind, DeBoer had outgrown the small, Baptist-affiliated school in South Dakota’s largest city.
Sanchez said he asked DeBoer if he had aspirations of coaching at a higher level. DeBoer, hesitantly, told him he did.
“He’s a South Dakota boy, and it seems like in the Midwest people don’t want to leave and I can understand why,” Sanchez recalled. “I said, ‘Kalen, you have more ability and should go forward.’ He said he had some inquiries, and I told him he needed to look into those possibilities.”
For good measure, Sanchez threatened to fire him if he didn’t take another job.
“I said that in a joking way,” he said. “I certainly wasn’t going to fire a guy who just won a national championship, but it was a way to kind of motivate him, and hopefully he would look for a position at a higher level, which he did. And I’m glad he did.”
DeBoer, who lived his first 35 years in South Dakota, is 49 now and head coach at Washington. He has led the unbeaten Huskies to the College Football Playoff in his second season, an effort that earned him coach of the year honors from The Associated Press last week. They play Texas in the semifinal at the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1.
No one knows if DeBoer really needed Sanchez’s nudge, but the coach still appreciates the belief his old boss had in him.
“I was still pretty young, and getting a chance to go be challenged at the next level with different people was certainly something I think he saw for me,” DeBoer said, “even if I didn’t feel that way at the time.”
DeBoer’s rise through the coaching ranks began a few weeks after his meeting with Sanchez when he was hired as Southern Illinois’ offensive coordinator. It was the first of six stops over 12 years.
In nine seasons as a head coach — Sioux Falls (2005-09), Fresno State (2020-21) and Washington (2022-23) — his record is 103-11.
“It is crazy,” said DeBoer’s high school coach, Mike Busch, drawing out the last word. “It’s by no accident, either. It’s hard to win games at any level, and him and his staff, they find a way to win and their kids find a way to win and they believe.”
Though DeBoer left South Dakota in 2010, South Dakota never left him. Neither did the lessons he learned from his mentor at Sioux Falls, NAIA Hall of Fame coach Bob Young.
Young, who died last January, spoke of DeBoer often with close friend Jim Heinitz, the retired coach at Augustana in Sioux Falls. Heinitz said Young knew DeBoer had the makings of a good coach and did what he could to foster his growth.
Young developed DeBoer into an All-America receiver who helped the Cougars win their first national championship in 1996 and kept him around to coach receivers the next year. Then he helped him get an assistant’s job at Washington High in Sioux Falls and hired him in 2000 as offensive coordinator. When Young retired, he urged Sanchez to hire DeBoer as his successor.
DeBoer went 67-3 in five seasons, 49-1 in conference games and won NAIA titles in 2006, 2008 and 2009. The Cougars went 56-1 from 2006-09, with the only loss coming in the 2007 championship game. His last Sioux Falls team outscored opponents 775-158 and beat North Dakota of the Football Championship Subdivision, 28-13.
His ties to Sioux Falls remain strong.
Washington defensive coordinator Chuck Morrell was DeBoer’s teammate and later his defensive coordinator at Sioux Falls. Huskies offensive coordinator Ryan Grubb was DeBoer’s line coach at Sioux Falls and on staff with him at Eastern Michigan and Fresno State.
“I understand who they are as people,” DeBoer said. “I know that they’re relentless in their work ethic and that they want to do the same things I want to, and that’s making a difference in the people around us and the lives we touch each and every day. I know that they’ll leave the ego at the door and do what’s always best for our team.”
DeBoer grew up in northeastern South Dakota, first in Corona, pop. 69, and later Milbank, pop. 3,500. His mother, Phylis Waterfall, worked at a drugstore while raising him and his brother and sister as a single parent.
“It probably forced me to grow up a little bit quicker,” DeBoer said. “But I will say this: I always felt like I had everything. I didn’t feel like I was missing anything. I had people around me, my dad, too. I knew everyone loved me. I knew I was going to be safe.
“Maybe there were times where things were a little bit harder,” he added. “I think it’s all part of my journey and what what made me who I am today.”
Busch, DeBoer’s coach at Milbank, remember him as a player who would do anything to help the team win. He was a dependable receiver. He filled in at quarterback for two games when the starter was injured to keep alive a run to the state semifinals his senior year. He made plays sideline-to-sideline as a middle linebacker.
Sioux Falls’ program was underfunded when DeBoer arrived as a player. The practice field was only 80 yards and turned to mud after the lightest of rains. Until 2007, when Bob Young Field opened, home games were played off campus.
The Cougars’ dominance over DeBoer’s five seasons as head coach, and maybe Sanchez’s nudge, led to his four-year run at Southern Illinois. Coordinator jobs followed at Eastern Michigan, Fresno State and Indiana, where he first met Michael Penix Jr., now the Huskies’ starting quarterback and the Heisman Trophy runner-up.
DeBoer went back to Fresno State for his first Division I head coaching job in 2020, and he took the Bulldogs from 3-3 in the pandemic-shortened season to 10-3 with a bowl win the next year.
“He wanted to progress up the ladder of college football, and to do that, I guess, you’ve got to pay your dues,” longtime Sioux Falls radio play-by-play man Tom Frederick said. “From NAIA to the NCAA probably was not the easiest thing to do.”
Washington hired him Nov. 29, 2021, to revive a program that had fallen off. DeBoer was able to retain key talent and he brought in Penix as a transfer.
“The relationship he has with Penix, there’s mutual respect,” Heinitz said. “You can see on TV that Penix and the rest of the players are really happy for him and the success he’s having, and they share the success.”
DeBoer’s home state has a proud football history. South Dakota State is now the dominant team in the FCS and 61 natives from the state of 895,000 have played in the NFL, with seven first-round draft picks and NFL career scoring leader Adam Vinatieri among them.
The people who know DeBoer from Sioux Falls said if there were a Mount Rushmore of football in the Mount Rushmore State, DeBoer would belong up there if Washington wins the national title.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re from small-town South Dakota or small-town Alabama or wherever, if coaching is your passion and you’re doing what Kalen’s doing, you’re going to make it to the top,” Busch said. “Down the road, is the NFL next for him or is another Power Five big team? Who knows? Right now it’s fun to watch the Huskies.”
DECEMBER 19, 2023:
SEATTLE (AP) — Kalen DeBoer landing the job at Washington two years ago seemed to be an unheralded transaction at the time.
It has turned out to be a shrewd decision by the Huskies. One might say it’s been perfect.
DeBoer was named The Associated Press coach of the year on Tuesday (Dec. 19, 2023) after leading the Huskies to a 13-0 record, the Pac-12 championship and a spot in the College Football Playoff in just his second year in charge at Washington. The Huskies will face Texas in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1 with a spot in the CFP championship game on the line.
In his two seasons, the Huskies are 23-2, leaving behind the bitter memory of a 4-8 record in 2021 that led to a change and brought DeBoer to Washington.
“It’s all about the people around me. This is a team award,” DeBoer said. “When you win, I tell the players this, you win football games, you’re going to get recognized and more awards are going to get shared. I’m fortunate enough to kind of be the figurehead of our team and receive these cool awards. Just really blessed.”
DeBoer received 30 of 52 first-place votes and had 113 points overall from AP Top 25 poll voters to easily outpace Florida State’s Mike Norvell (57 points). Missouri’s Eli Drinkwitz (38) and Arizona’s Jedd Fisch (28) were the only other coaches to receive multiple first-place votes.
DeBoer is the first Washington coach ever to be named the AP coach of the year and just the third Pac-12 coach to win the award in the last 25 years, joining Mike MacIntyre (Colorado, 2016) and Chip Kelly (Oregon, 2010).
“I think when dealing with the team, I think I’m the same. I think there’s job responsibilities that come along with this level that you continue to adjust to and learn from — the good, bad and ugly, whatever it was that had happened,” DeBoer said. “But I think when it comes to building the team, the foundation of it is the same, the same priorities.”
DeBoer is in just his fourth season as a head coach in the Bowl Subdivision. He was 67-3 at his alma mater, Sioux Falls, from 2005-09 and won three NAIA championships. At Fresno State, he went 12-6 in two seasons, including 9-3 the final year.
When the Washington job came open, DeBoer knew he was ready for the challenge of a Power Five program. But he was inheriting a team that went through a tumultuous season that included the firing of coach Jimmy Lake with two games still on the schedule.
While DeBoer won at nearly every stop, he still needed to prove to his new team that his methods would work.
“We were open ears to what he had to say, and he was so persistent in his genuineness and his commitment to take this program to the top that at the end of the day, it was unstoppable to be able to trust him,” first-team AP All-American wide receiver Rome Odunze said.
While it certainly helped to have talent like Odunze and Heisman Trophy runner up Michael Penix Jr., a significant amount of Washington’s success this season came because DeBoer and the Huskies were great in close games.
Each of Washington’s final eight games were decided by 10 points or fewer and all of them were in question into the fourth quarter. Washington’s final four wins – Utah, Oregon State, Washington State and Oregon – were decided by a total of 15 points.
That speaks to coaching. And belief.
“We’ve gotten here because he’s carried through with everything he said he was going to do with all his effort,” Odunze said.
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