Three of a Kind: How Alex Atkins teams with top assistants to push FSU offensive line to new heights

His boss was trying to play it cool, and Gabe Fertitta was about to lose his mind.

It was the summer of 2010, and Fertitta was getting started as Jon Williams’ offensive coordinator at Itawamba Community College in Fulton, Miss. They had just interviewed a promising young candidate for a vacant coaching position on their offensive staff, and Williams wrapped up the conversation with the obligatory post-interview pleasantries.

Thanks for coming in. We have several quality candidates we’re talking to, but once we make a decision, we’ll let you know.

Before the door was fully closed, Fertitta looked at his boss in disbelief.

“I said, ‘Jon, are we really about to let this guy walk out of here without offering him this job?'” Fertitta recalled with a laugh.

“He’s like, ‘You think we ought to offer it to him?'”

Within about two seconds, Fertitta was racing out of the room to stop Alex Atkins from getting in his car and driving nine hours back to Huntington, W.Va., where he was a graduate assistant coach at Marshall University.

“The job is yours if you want it,” Fertitta told Atkins, explaining that he would be coaching Itawamba’s offensive line and tight ends.

“I’ll be here in three days,” Atkins responded. “Let me get my stuff and come back down.”

That story has been funny and informative every time Fertitta has told it over the past 13 years, but it’s especially poignant now.

Beginning with those two early years at Itawamba, Atkins’ career has been on a steady and rapid trajectory toward the top of the college football coaching mountaintop. He went from junior college to an FCS program in Chattanooga, then to a trio of FBS schools — Georgia Southern, Tulane and Charlotte — before coming to Florida State to join Mike Norvell’s staff in 2020.

Atkins performed so well in his first two years with the Seminoles that he was promoted from offensive line coach to offensive coordinator in 2022. And earlier this year, CBS Sports named him one of college football’s “Top 15 Coaches Under 40.”

His name was right there alongside the likes of Southern Cal head coach Lincoln Riley, Oregon head coach Dan Lanning, Ohio State offensive coordinator Brian Hartline, and Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman. It was quite the recognition, but not the least bit surprising to Fertitta,.

“I remember when he walked in for the interview. Instantly, I got this feeling like, ‘There’s something about this guy,'” Fertitta recalled. “And throughout the interview, I remember thinking, ‘This is one of the most impressive people — forget the football side of it, which he was already brilliant at. But you could tell right there in the interview that this was a guy who could go to the ‘countriest’ of country kids in Mississippi, and they would love him and think he’s great. Or go to Atlanta or another big city — and everything in between — and he was going to be able to be personable with people, regardless of where they came from.”

The admiration between Atkins and Fertitta was mutual then.

It still is today.

While Atkins doesn’t necessarily romanticize that Itawamba job offer from his mid-20s — “It was either take the job or go back to being a G.A., so it wasn’t like there were a lot of options” — he does have nothing but love and respect for Fertitta.

They quickly became the best of friends during their time in junior college. It’s a relationship that has only grown tighter over the past dozen years, and it’s a big reason why Fertitta jumped at the chance to work with Atkins when the opportunity arose in early 2022.

Together, they — along with graduate assistant coach Cooper Williams — have spearheaded a previously unfathomable resurgence for the Florida State offensive line. From maybe the poorest-performing unit in Power Five football a few years ago to a group that should pave the way for one of the nation’s most explosive offenses in 2023.

Atkins gets most of the credit, of course, and the rewards that come with it.

He already has turned down several college and NFL opportunities during his time in Tallahassee. His name has been mentioned for multiple head coaching gigs, and that is undoubtedly going to continue in the future. He now makes over $1 million per year.

But there’s a reason why every time something good happens for him — whether it’s landing a big-time recruit or receiving an honor in the profession — that Atkins always makes a point to publicly give flowers to Fertitta and Williams.

“Without them,” he told Warchant, “none of it would be possible.”

Just Glad that @Fertitta_Gabe and @CooperWilliams_ allow me to work for them!! They make me way better than I am!! https://t.co/81znFfypVe

— Coach Atkins (@CoachAAtkins) April 22, 2023

Gabe Fertitta: ‘Mad scientist’ meets ‘good ball coach’

Gabe Fertitta isn’t the stereotypical offensive line coach. He looks more like a guy who played wide receiver at a Division-III college. And that’s exactly where Fertitta’s college coaching journey really got started, when he was catching passes for Mississippi College in the early 2000s.

Even back then, the New Orleans native showed an uncommon ability to understand football conceptually and communicate it to his teammates. And nobody knew that better than Jon Williams, who would go on to be the play-it-cool head coach at Itawamba several years later.

Williams was Mississippi College’s offensive line coach and strength coach earlier in Fertitta’s playing career, and he was named offensive coordinator when Fertitta was a senior. Because Williams was an OL coach by trade, and most of his experience was related to the running game, he would actually lean on Fertitta for ideas about the passing attack.

The young receiver was so helpful in that capacity that when he graduated, Williams convinced the school’s head coach to hire him on as a graduate assistant.

“On the first day, I figured I would be working with the receivers. But he’s like, ‘Where are you going? You’re doing O-line,'” Fertitta recalled with a laugh. “I was like, ‘Are you kidding me? I know there’s five people out there. That’s really all I know about it.'”

It ended up being an incredible opportunity.

That one-year crash course on offensive line play was huge for Fertitta’s knowledge as a coach, and he showed so much promise that when Williams took a high school head coaching job one year later at Lucust Fork, Ala., he brought Fertitta along as his offensive coordinator.

It was a small school in a town of only 1,200 people. But looking back, Fertitta knows running his own offense was an incredible opportunity.

“I was probably 22 years old,” he said.

After a year there, Fertitta moved on to Louisiana powerhouse Baton Rouge Catholic as an assistant coach for three seasons. Then he took the offensive coordinator job at Itawamba, where he would work side-by-side with Alex Atkins during that 2010 season.

“It was fantastic,” Fertitta said of working with Atkins. “It was really good.”

While Atkins’ official position was coaching offensive line and tight ends, Fertitta saw immediately that the new assistant understood nuances of quarterback play and the skill positions. And since they were the only assistant coaches on offense, and because Itawamba wasn’t nearly as talented as most of its opponents, the two young coaches often burned the midnight oil.

“Alex and I would stay up there all hours of the night, trying to find ways to scheme people and beat people,” Fertitta recalled.

They also would share ideas and learn from each other.

“I had been around college coaching before I went there,” Atkins said. “That’s usually specialized coaching. And then you’re around a guy like Fertitta, and he can do ALL of it. Because he was a high school coach. So he had a base level of pretty much everything, which was eye-opening to me. He could coach basically everything — from the tight ends to the O-Line to the running backs and receivers. He had a really strong knowledge of each position.

“And he’s a really good teacher. I pride myself on knowing a lot of football, but with him coming from the high school ranks, he was a better teacher than I was. So I was able to take a lot of his teaching philosophies and implement them with what I knew from the football side.”

While they worked together for only that one year at Itawamba, it was the beginning of a lifelong friendship.

Feritta soon went back to high schools — he got his first head coaching gig at St. Stanislaus, a Catholic school in Bay St. Louis, Miss., then moved back to Baton Rouge Catholic as offensive coordinator and eventually a successful stint as head coach — while Atkins continued his ascension through the college ranks.

To this day, Atkins brags on Fertitta’s high school coaching resume as if it were his own. He points out that Fertitta took St. Stanislaus from a winless record to an undefeated regular season in one year. He proudly mentions Fertitta’s two state championships at Baton Rouge Catholic.

And the pair have remained close through the years.

Atkins often found himself recruiting Fertitta’s players when he was at Tulane or Charlotte, and he would come back to celebrate each of Fertitta’s state championships. And their wives — Brittany Atkins and Charity Fertitta — have been best of friends as well.

So when Atkins was promoted to Florida State’s offensive coordinator following the 2021 season and the Seminoles had an opening on their support staff due to Tony Tokarz’ promotion to quarterbacks coach, Atkins had one name in mind. The guy who helped hire him at Itawamba.

Fertitta, who had finally made the jump from high schools to colleges and spent the previous year on Louisville’s support staff, officially joined the Seminoles in February 2022 as senior offensive analyst.

“He’s a good ball coach and he has a wealth of knowledge,” Atkins said. “He’s not only a good ball coach, but he’s smart, analytical, a people person, and a good staff guy.”

And he was a perfect fit for this particular situation.

With Atkins now taking on an expanded role as offensive coordinator, he needed another staffer he could trust to keep an eye on the offensive line. The fact that Fertitta had spent the past year on the staff of former Cardinals coach Scott Satterfield — who is an expert when it comes to the outside-zone running game — was an added benefit.

And because Florida State head coach Mike Norvell was very familiar with Fertitta as well, it was an easy decision.

As it turns out, it has been better than any of them could have envisioned.

“He’s been a blessing,” Atkins said.

Because he is an off-field staff member, Fertitta is not allowed by NCAA rule to do any hands-on coaching with Florida State’s linemen; Atkins and G.A. Cooper Williams are the only ones who can do that. But Fertitta contributes in so many other ways.

A devout film junkie, Fertitta helps Florida State’s players and coaches by mining other college and NFL teams’ video footage for all types of information.

During the season, he will work a week ahead to scout the strengths, weaknesses and strategies of opposing defensive linemen. Then when Atkins and Norvell are ready to begin game-planning for that opponent, Fertitta will share his breakdown and also offer up ideas for different approaches the Seminoles can take.

“I may have an opinion,” Fertitta said. “But it’s not really my position to give my opinion unless they ask me.”

During the late-spring and summer months, like when Atkins was on the road recruiting in May, Fertitta will dig deeper into big-picture topics. And he’ll try to prepare for ideas that might come up when the offensive staff really starts to dial into schemes they want to implement for the season.

If someone suggests blocking a play a certain way or adding a screen concept, Fertitta likes to already have video cut-ups ready of other teams executing it in the past.

“I take pride in if a topic comes up, I’ve already done the research,” Fertitta said. “That is really important, I feel, for a person in this role.”

“Gabe is like our information bank,” Atkins said. “You ask him something, and he’s like, ‘Oh yeah, I saw that three years ago when Utah State did it.’ He’s just constantly watching film, making sure we have ideas. He’s like a mad scientist.”

Then there are the ways Fertitta helps individual players. Just because he can’t coach them directly doesn’t mean he can’t provide them with information to help them become more successful.

“Alex may come tell me that we have a guard who is having a hard time blocking a 3-technique (defensive tackle) in man-pass protection,” Fertitta said. “So I’ll go find the best guard blocking a 3-technique in man-pass protection in the NFL, who looks like this particular player physically. And I’ll pull those clips and analyze them so they’re there and they can watch them.

“The access we have here to film is unbelievable. When I was coaching in high schools, we would have to beg, borrow or steal to get college or NFL film. Then we’d have to download it to our HUDL system to break it down. I would spend countless hours doing that. The work that I did then takes like three mouse-clicks here.”

As much as he loves his role in the Florida State offense and cherishes the opportunity to work with Atkins, Fertitta isn’t shy when asked about his long-term aspirations. He loved being a head coach so much back on the high school level that he wants to step into a leadership role like that again, but this time for a college program.

And whether his next gig is serving as an offensive line coach, working with some other position group or being an offensive coordinator at a smaller school, the ultimate ambition is being a head coach on the Power 5 level.

“I think my path has been a lot different, so I think that will take some time,” Fertitta said. “But I’ve had opportunities to go other places and get started as a position coach. But this place is special because of the way Coach Norvell runs it, and because I get to do it every day with a guy in Alex that really is one of my best friends in this world. So I couldn’t be any happier here. It’s a lot of fun.

“And no one ever has to worry about what my motivations are. They call us the support staff for a reason. That’s our job. Our job is to support Coach Atkins, Coach Norvell, whoever else needs us. That’s what our role is. And the instant that people in this position forget that, it can become a problem. And I think that’s why it’s worked really well with Alex and I. There’s that relationship there, and he knows that I’m not gonna get it flipped upside down.”

Cooper Williams: ‘He just wants everybody to be successful’

When Alex Atkins’ first graduate assistant OL coach at FSU was hired away by Alabama following the 2020 season, Mike Norvell had a candidate he wanted Atkins to consider.

Cooper Williams was a walk-on offensive lineman at Memphis when Norvell arrived there in 2016, and since then he had been working his way into the coaching ranks — first as a student assistant and then as a quality control analyst with the Tigers.

When Norvell moved from Memphis to FSU, Williams was invited to come along as a volunteer assistant, working with tight ends coach Chris Thomsen. But Norvell thought the offensive line G.A. job would be a perfect fit, so he pitched it to Atkins.

“I kind of laughed when he asked me,” Atkins said. “I said, ‘Coach, Coop’s awesome. I’d take him today.'”

While Atkins and Williams didn’t know each other before they both arrived at Florida State following the 2019 season, it didn’t take long for the young staffer to earn Atkins’ respect. Every time the offensive coaches came together for planning meetings, Atkins kept noticing that Florida State’s tight ends coach had all of his prep work done before the rest of the staff.

“I would be like, ‘How does Coach Thomsen find the time to do this stuff?'” Atkins recalled with a laugh. “Coop is probably the most detailed worker I’ve ever been around.”

With no prodding, Atkins offers up story after story about Williams’ work ethic. How he is constantly looking for ways to help FSU’s players and the other coaches.

“I’ve told him I’m going to speak at a coaching clinic, and he’ll put together an entire program without me asking and say, ‘See if you like it.’ And it will be a 98-slide presentation,” Atkins said. “I walk in the office in the morning, I’m grabbing coffee, and he’s already in there with three players in the O-Line meeting room going over corrections. I’m talking early in the morning, and he does it all day.

“He wants to be good, and he likes working. He’s kind of old school. He’s one of those people that just wants everybody to be successful and is not worried about anything else.”

Williams got it honest.

He literally grew up on the ball fields of Memphis, the son of longtime youth and high school baseball coach Tommy Williams. Having played sports his entire life and watched his father coach for decades, Cooper Williams has always — and only — wanted to work in sports.

He said his father, who passed away last month at the age of 68, was his inspiration.

It’s why he has taken on any and every role Norvell has asked since his playing days ended. Why in a field where everyone works incredibly long hours, he is frequently singled out for putting in more. And why he was even willing to come to FSU in a volunteer capacity that first year.

“I think it also shows how much I appreciate and love working for Coach Norvell,” Williams said.

Unlike Fertitta, Williams is permitted by the NCAA to do hands-on coaching because he is a graduate assistant coach. And in many ways, he is a perfect complement to Atkins.

The Seminoles’ offensive line coach/offensive coordinator calls Williams “relationship positive.” In other words, when Atkins is getting onto a player about a missed assignment or some other miscue, Williams can play the “good cop” role.

“He’s my positive coach,” Atkins said with a laugh. “He does a phenomenal job.”

And he’s always there.

Because player development is at the heart of Norvell’s program — as well as Atkins’ position group — the offensive line coach requires that his linemen get at least 30 minutes of individualized meeting time daily. It could be devoted to improving techniques, breaking down opponents’ tendencies, game-plan installation or really anything the players believe will help them perform at a higher level.

And most of that meeting time falls on Williams because Atkins has so many other responsibilities as offensive coordinator and ace recruiter. The meetings often start by 6 a.m. and go well into the evening.

With upwards of 20 linemen on the roster, that makes for a long day. Every day.

And Williams loves it.

“If the kids aren’t playing well and doing their job on the field, then my job wouldn’t matter at all. I wouldn’t have one,” Williams said. “So those meetings are obviously the first priority, no matter what. Whether that means me getting up earlier, staying later, sleeping less.”

FSU’s other coaches say Williams brings much more to the offensive line than a strong work ethic.

Because he has been with Norvell for going on eight years now, “he knows the offense from top to bottom,” Atkins said. And Atkins added that he feels perfectly comfortable with Williams taking half of the linemen to work on drills in practice while he takes the other half.

That approach is important for the players because it provides them with more individualized instruction. And it’s invaluable for Williams, who hopes to land a college offensive line coaching job in the future.

Williams laughs when he recalls the only time Atkins has really yelled at him over these last two years. It happened when Atkins assigned him a group of linemen to work with, and Williams paused to ask exactly what the OL coach wanted him to do.

“Go!” Atkins screamed. “Get out of here!”

Williams never made that mistake again.

And while he says his biggest motivations are making sure Florida State’s offensive linemen are improving and that Atkins has everything he needs to do his job, Williams is quick to point out that he is benefiting greatly as well.

He believes getting to work alongside Atkins and Fertitta every day is priceless. From learning more about football to building relationships to managing time more effectively, Williams said he is constantly becoming a better person and coach just by watching how they operate.

“Those two guys … I’ll always look up to them,” Williams said, adding that he couldn’t ask for a better work environment than Florida State’s OL meeting room. “It’s awesome. We never come to ‘work’ any day. When it’s time to be serious, we’re as serious as it can get. But we love to have fun. And we love football. It makes it so much fun just to come to work every day.”

The magic is in the water? Or the humility?

Before he breaks it down in detail, Cooper Williams laughs at himself and his self-described “stupid theory” about the Mississippi River.

It’s something he came up with this past year, and it’s the best way he can explain how three men from very different backgrounds could fit so perfectly together.

Atkins hails from Chicago but has lived in Memphis and New Orleans; Williams is from Memphis; and Fertitta grew up in Louisiana. They all spent most of their formative years either close to the Mississippi River, or in Atkins’ case as a youth in Chicago, near water that fed into it.

“It’s something about the river,” Williams said. “I don’t know if anyone else believes in that, other than myself. But there’s something about all of our backgrounds that mesh so well together.”

Whether it’s something in the water or what’s the in the minds and hearts of the three men involved, there’s no denying that the driving forces behind Florida State’s offensive line improvement — Atkins, Fertitta and Williams — have created a wonderful concoction.

There’s the hands-on teaching, tireless work ethic and positive approach of Williams.

There’s Fertitta’s seemingly limitless knowledge and never-ending quest for improvement.

And then there’s Atkins bringing it all together.

“It’s a team-oriented deal for the full development of the offensive line,” Atkins said. “And I think we’re seeing fruits of that labor. We offer ’round-the-clock, 24 hours-a-day availability. It’s like I tell the guys: If you want to be good like you say you want to be good, you have no excuse at Florida State.”

The 2023 season figures to be a special year for the entire Florida State football team, and perhaps especially for the offensive line.

The Seminoles return four starters up front from last season, four other linemen with major college starting experience, and a slew of other capable backups. And to hear Williams and Fertitta tell it, the person leading the entire group is the most special of all.

They say the fact that Atkins is so quick to share his love for both of them on social media — seemingly every time he receives praise — is all you need to know.

“It’s awesome,” Williams said of Atkins’ posts. “It’s rare in this business. It’s unexpected. When you work for someone that’s humble enough to not always take the credit for themselves, and to share it, that’s something I’ll always be grateful for. And that’s something I’ll always want to do if I’m in that position, where someone’s working for me.”

The simple fact that this article was being written — and that Florida State fans are getting to learn about Atkins’ support staff in such detail — speaks volumes, according to Fertitta.

The Seminoles’ offensive line trio might not be together for too much longer, unfortunately. Fertitta has aspirations of becoming an on-the-field coach, and Williams can only be a graduate assistant for one more season, per NCAA rules.

So they’re going to savor this working relationship for as long as they can. And keep taking the Florida State offensive line to the greatest heights possible.

“Having three of us there, it allows you to see a little more,” Fertitta said. “But you could not do this structure if the person at the top, Alex, had a very strong ego. You couldn’t do it. It wouldn’t work. It would be an absolute disaster. It would crumble.

“The thing that makes it all go isn’t my expertise, Coop’s expertise or even Alex’s expertise. It’s the fact that Alex is comfortable with other people getting credit. He’s OK with other people’s ideas being adopted — even over his own, if he feels like that’s the better idea.

“That’s the magic glue that makes it all work.”

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