UTSA's Perry Eliano to become Bowling Green defensive coordinator

Texas-San Antonio special teams coordinator and safeties coach Perry Eliano is the new defensive coordinator for Bowling Green coach Mike Jinks, according to a source.

Texas-San Antonio special teams coordinator and safeties coach Perry Eliano is the new defensive coordinator for Bowling Green coach Mike Jinks, according to a source.

This season was Eliano’s fifth with UTSA. He’s been the program’s safeties coach since his arrival and became special teams coordinator after his first year.

Eliano was an assistant at Central Arkansas from 2006–10, coaching defensive backs throughout his tenure and was associate head coach his last season. He was Sam Houston State’s secondary coach in ’05 after an earlier two-season stint at Central Arkansas, where he coached running backs for a year before moving to wide receivers coach.

While at Central Arkansas, Eliano coached then-wide receiver Mike Norvell, who was hired as Memphis’s head coach last week. Eliano got his start in coaching as a graduate assistant at his alma mater, Stephen F. Austin, from 2001–02.

A Killeen, Texas native, he was a safety and linebacker for the Lumberjacks from 1996–99. Eliano joins Jinks, who was hired Tuesday to replace former Bowling Green coach Dino Babers, who took the same position at Syracuse after winning the MAC championship this season with a 10–3 record.

This is Jinks’s first collegiate head coaching job after he spent the last three seasons as Texas Tech’s running backs coach. He added the title of assistant head coach this season and is a former longtime Texas high school coach.