Specs: Former San Diego State assistant coach will be hired by Oklahoma to coach special teams
Brent Venables is bringing in an analyst whose unit ranked in the top 10 for three consecutive years, as the Sooners finished the 2017 season with the nation’s 127th-best special teams efficiency rating.
The new special teams coordinator for Oklahoma, according to coach Brent Venables, has been named.
Collin Kennedy of Sooners Illustrated reported on Thursday night that Doug Deakin, a former San Diego State special teams coordinator, is anticipated to join OU as a special teams analyst.
Kennedy and Matt Zenitz, the national reporter for 247 Sports, cited unidentified sources when they reported that Deakin would take over for Jay Nunez, who left to accept a job at Alabama.
Since his walk-on days in 2010, when he was a senior and elected team captain, Deakin has been associated with the Aztecs for seventeen years.
More recently, he spent six seasons as the special teams coordinator at SDSU. The Aztecs were in the top 10 of ESPN’s FBS special teams efficiency three years in a row, including the 2022 season, when they were rated No. 2 in the country with a 72.2 efficiency rating, according to his most recent bio on the SDSU athletics website. The Aztecs had the ninth-best total special teams efficiency in the US the previous season.
Deakin takes over at OU from a special teams squad that, per ESPN, finished the 2017 season rated No. 127 in the country.
On practice days, analysts are permitted to coach players, but not on game days. That means after working with the analyst all week, each special teams unit will be led by a different position coach on game days.
In 2024, the Sooners will return both their punter and kicker, despite the fact that both positions are open to competition.
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