Cal Football hires Terrence Brown to help coach defensive backs
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Cal Football hires Terrence Brown to help coach defensive backs
A new face with West Coast ties to lead the next generation of Takers.
It’s a Festivus miracle—Terrence Brown will be joining the Cal Football coaching staff!
Per the official announcement, Brown will be joining our current defensive backs coach—Tre Watson—to “share duties” in leading the secondary.
Brown is—unfortunately—a Stanfurd alumnus, but don’t let that taint your view of him! He started coaching as the cornerbacks coach for the Spring of 2015 at Cal Poly before moving on to become a defensive graduate assistant with Washington for the 2015 season. He was the full-time cornerbacks coach at Vanderbilt for two seasons, followed by two seasons as the assistant defensive backs coach back up at Washington. Per 247, we can evaluate his prowess as a recruiter; he’s listed as the primary recruiter of two three-star DBs at Vanderbilt and secondary recruiter of a three-star Californian DB at Washington, but it’s still early in his coaching career. He has also twice been honored as a member of 247 Sports’ 30 Under 30 in 2019 and 2020.
Here’s a list of all his stops as a coach, courtesy of the Cal announcement:
Terrence Brown Coaching History
Season: Team – Coaching Position (Postseason, Champions)
2015 (Spring): Cal Poly – Cornerbacks
2015: Washington – Defensive Graduate Assistant (Heart Of Dallas Bowl)
2016: Washington – Defensive Graduate Assistant (College Football Playoff, Peach Bowl, Pac-12 Champion, Pac-12 North Champion)
2017: Washington – Defensive Graduate Assistant (Fiesta Bowl, Pac-12 North Co-Champion)
2018: Vanderbilt – Cornerbacks (Texas Bowl)
2019: Vanderbilt – Cornerbacks
2020: Washington – Assistant Defensive Backs (Pac-12 North Champion)
2021: Washington – Assistant Defensive Backs
Present: California – Defensive Backs
In an interview with 247 after Washington’s win over Cal this year, Brown emphasized the importance of mental toughness among the DBs as well as trust in their training. He expects players in the secondary to contribute to stopping the run and would fit in with the old Tedford philosophy of players being “real physical”.
This hire fills the vacancy of special teams coordinator Charlie Ragle leaving to become the head coach of FCS Idaho State, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see some rearrangement among the coaches in the coming weeks so we can officially have a special teams coordinator.
Coach Brown was a 3* recruit out of Orange, CA where he had offers from Boise State, Oregon, Oregon State, and San Diego State before choosing Stanfurd.
Welcome to the Cal Family, Terrence!
Cal Football hires Terrence Brown to help coach defensive backs
Gobears49
I was down on Watson because he had only one full year working as a full assistant coach at UNLV before coming to Cal, which I thought was too short for a Power 5 school. Watson was also a 247 Sports 30 Under 30, as was Brown.
I was down on Watson at the start of last season because I didn't think he had enough experience to be as sole D backs coach, but that has now changed. Actually, I thought Watson did a very good job after a few games. Hearns is a star as a cornerback and probably others in the defensive backfield are doing a great job and are either freshmen or sophomores. I give the credit for that to Watson.
Brown has a lot more experience than Watson at this point -- four years as a full time assistant coach.
What I've learned this season is that coaches can be full coaches at lower level teams (like FCS Cal Poly) but when they move up to an FBS school, their title moves down to graduate assistant coach, like Brown was at Washington after leaving Cal Poly.
The reverse happened for the new head coach at Oregon, who was a full time coach somewhere at a lesser school but then had to become a graduate assistant coach when he moved to work at Alabama, but that job allowed him to jump to another FBS school as a full assistant coach, which really helped his career.
Hope that Brown is also a good recruiter!.. Candidates to become the next special teams coordinator? Buh?