All Sooners

Reports: Oklahoma to Hire Zac Alley as Defensive Coordinator

After announcing on Thursday morning that Ted Roof would not return to OU in 2024, the Sooners’ seem to have found the defensive coordinator’s replacement.

Randall Sweet

Reports: Oklahoma to Hire Zac Alley as Defensive Coordinator
Reports: Oklahoma to Hire Zac Alley as Defensive Coordinator /
In this story:

On Thursday evening, multiple sources reported that Oklahoma will hire Jacksonville State defensive coordinator Zac Alley to take on the same role in Norman.

The news comes on the same day that OU formally announced the team will part ways with former defensive coordinator Ted Roof, who held the position for two years.

Alley was a student assistant and graduate assistant at Clemson from 2011-2018, working under Brent Venables for the majority of his time with the Tigers. Since then, Alley made stops at Boise State and Louisiana Monroe before taking the defensive coordinator job at Jacksonville State in 2022.

This season, the Gamecocks allowed only 21.2 points per game, coming in at No. 33 in the NCAA in points allowed per game. During JSU’s first season at the FBS level in 2023, Alley helped lead the Gamecocks to nine wins and a bowl victory.

According to the Anniston Star, Alley was the youngest defensive coordinator at the FBS level when he held that title at Louisiana Monroe in 2021 at the age of 28.

Like both Roof and Venables, Alley's background is coaching linebackers, with the 29-year-old coordinator serving as the linebackers coach at Boise State, ULM and Jacksonville State.

While widely reported citing unnamed sources, the move has not yet been made official or announced by the university.

Published
Randall Sweet
RANDALL SWEET

Randall is a recruiting analyst and staff writer at AllSooners focusing primarily on OU Football and the recruiting trail. Working as a journalist, Randall has covered the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma City Thunder, and high school sports across the state. A 2022 University of Oklahoma graduate, Randall hails from Lubbock, TX. While in college, Sweet wrote for the OU Daily in addition to working with Sooner Sports Pad and OU Nightly. Following his time at OU, Sweet served as the Communications Coordinator at Visit Oklahoma City before leaving to join the team at AllSooners. The West Texas native has bylines in the Norman Transcript and is a Staff Writer for Inside the Thunder. Randall holds a bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Oklahoma in Norman, OK. 

Home/Football