Texas A&M adds former Ole Miss assistant Marquel Blackwell as RB coach

Monday afternoon, On3 Ole Miss Spirit’s Ben Garrett reported that Ole Miss running backs coach Marquel Blackwell is leaving for Texas A&M to take over the same position.

“The Ole Miss Spirit has learned Marquel Blackwell, who was hired from Houston around this time a year ago, is leaving the Rebels to join Jimbo Fisher’s staff at Texas A&M. Off-field-assistant Elijah Sandweiss, according to the Spirit’s Chuck Rounsaville, will be joining Blackwell in College Station,” reported Garrett.

The move comes almost exactly one month since it was announced that Texas A&M would not renew the contract of running backs coach Tommie Robinson.

In the 2022 season, Blackwell was responsible for coaching a two headed running back monster in true-freshman Quinshon Judkins and now NFL bound Zach Evans. Judkins had a Freshman All-American and SEC rushing leader level season with 1,567 rushing yards and 16 touchdowns. Evans, a former five-star prospect, 936 rushing yards and nine touchdowns himself.

More on Blackwell

(This information is provided by On3’s Kaiden Smith)

Before Maquel Blackwell started his coaching career, he was a standout collegiate quarterback. Blackwell played quarterback at South Florida from 1999-2002, leading the Bulls to a 30–12 record as a starter. He was a dual-threat quarterback that ended his career in Tampa with 9,108 yards and 57 touchdowns in air and 1,235 rushing yards and 20 rushing touchdowns on the ground.

He went undrafted in the 2003 NFL Draft but spent time with the New York Jets and Tampa Bay Buccaneers as well as in the Arena Football League with Tampa Bay Storm and Alabama Steeldogs and the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League. 

Blackwell started his coaching career in 2006, spending three seasons at Freedom High School in Tampa before making his collegiate coaching debut at his alma mater USF in a quality control position. His first position coaching job would come in 2012 when he became the running backs coach at Western Kentucky, a role he’d go on to assume at Toledo and West Virginia. 

In 2019 he joined Dana Holgorsen at Houston, where he’d serve as the co-offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach for one season and the running backs coach for the following two seasons. He joined Lane Kiffin’s Ole Miss staff in 2022 as their running backs coach, helping the Rebels become the third-best rushing offense in the nation only behind the option rushing attacks of Air Force and Army.