After signing a seven-year contract with Indiana's athletic director set to leave Bloomington and promoting the youngest coordinating duo in the Big Ten, Tom Allen continues to bet on himself and his system at Indiana.
New tight ends coach Kevin Wright and new safeties coach Jason Jones are betting on him too.
Indiana head coach Tom Allen has continuously bet on himself throughout his three seasons as the Hoosiers’ head coach – from adding on Kane Wommack as the linebackers coach and then handing over the defensive coordinator reins to the youngest Big Ten coordinator in 2019, to bringing up the conference’s new youngest coordinator, in Nick Sheridan, who was one of his original hires in 2017, to replace Kalen DeBoer, whose offensive schemes were at the heart of the success of Allen’s best team and who was a hire made solely by Allen in January 2019.
After the decades it took for Indiana to begin investing in its football program, Allen signed his seven-year contract with Indiana in early-December with the understanding that athletic director Fred Glass, who was the catalyst in those investments, wouldn’t be in Bloomington long enough to see the first season of the contract, even when schools like Florida State were tossing his name around for their vacant head coaching positions.
He has believed in the staff that he has put together in Bloomington, an ambitious Florida recruiting strategy and the brand and culture of Indiana football that is rooted in his personal core values and life principles.
Now, after he did all the betting and led Indiana to its best season in 26 years, personnel across the country – like new tight ends coach Kevin Wright and new safeties coach Jason Jones – are betting on Allen too.
“Coach Allen’s one of the good guys in college football right now,” Wright said when he and Jones were introduced to the media Sunday morning. “Having known him for so long, you know what a guy's about.”
Wright, who comes to Bloomington after winning 44 games in five seasons with IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, knows the type of coach Allen was when they both coached at the high school level in Central Indiana back in the early-2000s. He, as well as Jones, mentioned Allen’s passion. Wright reminisced the days when he and his peers would poke fun at Allen for the way he’d jump around, in pseudo-fear that Allen would injure a player.
Jones recalled meeting Allen on the recruiting trail in Dallas in 2012 and credited him as a responsible party for why Jones left Oklahoma State for Ole Miss in 2013, a couple years before Allen, Jones and then-defensive coordinator Dave Wommack led Ole Miss to the best defensive season in the country.
RELATED: Jason Jones named Indiana's next safeties coach
Largely, not much has changed, in terms of who Allen is, Jones and Wright said. Changes can often be seen in coaches who “climb the ladder,” especially as quickly as Allen did, Wright said. But Allen has knocked over a garbage can while celebrating a win with the student section, passed out tickets to the 2019 Northwestern game in Indiana’s union building, brought raw emotion to the head coaching position and created a “Love Each Other” culture for his players.
“I think the world of him,” Jones said. “He's never changed. I mean, from 2012, he's the same guy today. In coaching world, that's what you appreciate as a coach.”
For both assistants, the move was certainly a step up. Wright, after taking over for Heisman Trophy-winner Chris Weinke at IMG, built a national powerhouse high school program that fielded a number of four- and five-star prospects and was regularly in the nation’s top-10 programs during his tenure. Jones turned Florida Atlantic’s secondary into the best pass-defending secondary in the country, with 22 total interceptions, in the one year he coached under Lane Kiffin.
But, while neither assistant was coaching in the Big Ten, neither coach was going to take the first job that was offered. There were certainly opportunities for Wright during his five years at IMG, and it was simply a matter of time for Jones, who had coached in the Big 12 and SEC and lost his promising head coach at FAU after one year.
RELATED: Kevin Wright names Indiana's next tight ends coach
The time, place and people needed to be right, Wright said. He knew who Allen was and who he is now, and Jones knew as well, though they were in Allen’s life on two separate occasions. Knowing what they knew, they both bet on Allen and Indiana to make their next steps, and when talking about Big Ten Championships, that’s not insignificant.
“Coaches were just talking about, ‘How long has been since we went to a Big Ten Championship?’” Wright said. “And I believe we could do it.”
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