Inside The Huskies

Huskies Hire Former Purdue Coach to Run the Defense

Ryan Walters will replace Steve Belichick, who is expected to join his father at North Carolina.

Dan Raley

Former Purdue coach Ryan Walters will join the UW as its new defensive coordinator.
Former Purdue coach Ryan Walters will join the UW as its new defensive coordinator. / Dale Young-Imagn Images

While Steve Belichick just sort of absent-mindedly disappeared from the University of Washington football program, with no public farewell or formal acknowledgement of any sort, the Huskies announced on Friday that former Purdue head coach Ryan Walters will become the new defensive coordinator.

Walters, 38, will come to Montlake to resurrect his coaching career after getting fired after just two seasons on the job, with the Boilermakers going through a 1-11 meltdown this past season, leading to his dismissal.

While the heading-coaching thing didn't work out for him, Walters previously built a reputation as a defensive coordinator for Illinois and Missouri, and apparently Jedd Fisch hadn't forgotten his prior success.

"Today, Washington football added a tremendous defensive coach and person to our program," Fisch said in a statement released by the school. "Hiring Ryan Walters allows us to continue to build on the foundation of the 2024 defense while continuing to grow and improve. His experience in the Big Ten Conference was vital in this hire."

As for Belichick, he's expected to join his father Bill Belichick's North Carolina staff in some capacity, though the ACC school still hadn't made an announcement while the UW was revealing its hiring of his replacement.

Asked before the Sun Bowl if he was leaving, Belichick sidestepped the question and there was no mention of him and his future plans once the game was played and the Huskies lost 35-34 to Louisville.

Clearly, Walters has his work cut out for him in rebuilding a defense that returns only a handful of starters from a unit that gave up four offensive touchdowns and 371 yards of total offense on Tuesday in El Paso.

From that game in Texas, the Huskies will return just four starters in edge rusher Isaiah Ward, safety Makell Esteen and cornerbacks Ephesians Prysock and Leroy Bryant, though there were a host of injured defensive players watching on the sideline, either having been previous starters or having the ability to do so.

Walters also will need a safeties coach added to the Husky staff following the hiring this week of the Huskies' Vinnie Sunseri as a defensive coordinator for Jacksonville State, a Conference USA team from Alabama.

Before going to Purdue, Walters served as the defensive coordinator at Illinois for the 2021 and 2022 seasons. In his second season in Champaign, he coached the Illini defense to a No. 1 ranking nationally in scoring at 12.3 points per game and No. 2 in total defense at 263.8 yards an outing.

Illinois cornerback Devon Witherspoon became a consensus All-America selection and a first-round draft pick, beating Walters to Seattle by joining the Seahawks two years ago.

Walters played college football at Colorado, where his father was a quarterback. Originally a Buffaloes QB himself, the son moved to safety, where he became a three-year starter, served as a team captain and earned team MVP honors as a senior in 2008.

He began his coaching career as a student assistant at Colorado in 2009, then became a graduate assistant coach the following season at Arizona, well before Fisch arrived there, and was elevated to full-time defensive backs coach.

After stops at Oklahoma, North Texas and Memphis, Walters made a Husky connection by joining Gary Pinkel's Missouri staff in 2015 as his safeties coach, with Pinkel, Don James' UW offensive coordinator, retiring from coaching the following season.

Walters is the second coach to come from Purdue to Montlake, following JaMarcus Shephard, who was the UW wide receivers coach for Kalen DeBoer in 2022 and 2023 and is with DeBoer now at Alabama.

With Belichick and Sunseri leaving after just one season, Fisch loses the two people he hired from the New England Patriots while the eight Arizona assistant coaches he brought with him are still in place at the UW.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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