Geoff Collins explains how head coaching experience helps as defensive coordinator

Earlier this month Mack Brown and North Carolina hired Geoff Collins as the team’s next defensive coordinator following his one year hiatus from coaching.

Collins has five years of defensive coordinator experience under his belt at the FBS level, but more recently has five years of head coaching experience as well with stops at Temple and Georgia Tech. And in his introductory press conference, Collins was asked how his experience as a head coach involved on both sides of the ball works to his advantage as he returns to exclusively coaching the defense.

“Being in those meetings has been invaluable,” Collins said. “Even this time this year when I’ve had a unique perspective to kind of look at the game from kind of an outsider’s perspective has been huge too, and I wrote these four principles down that just keep showing up as I watch ball in the NFL or in college.”

As a head coach Collins was able to sit in on offensive meetings and learned more about how coaches on that side of the ball view the game from their perspective. But after spending all of last year breaking down film and study trends from the college and NFL level at all angles, he’s added to his arsenal of knowledge. Pinpointing four traits that he believes defenses in today’s game need to have in order to be successful.

“Obviously be strong up the middle, have the ability to set edges, and this day and age you cannot allow easy access throws because everything’s an RPO, everything’s quick, get the ball out. So denying easy access throws, and then affecting the quarterback,” Collins explained.

“So we have to build the system and put the players in position to do those four things on every snap. So those are the things that take away throughout the year that I’ve kind of honed in on.”

Collins was fired four games into his fourth season at the helm for Georgia Tech in 2022 following a 1-3 start. And in all three of his full seasons with the Yellow Jackets, Collins’ defenses finished as the second-worst scoring unit in the ACC allowing over 30 points per game.

Hopefully Collins past experience and new viewpoint of football will work in his favor in his next coaching gig as he looks to help a North Carolina team that desperately needs his help, with his hiring marking the third defensive coordinator to work under Mack Brown since his return to Chapel Hill in 2019.