Bronco Mendenhall has reassembled, in New Mexico, the group that got UVA Football from two wins to the Orange Bowl in four years.
“I shared this picture with some of my staff members of a kid, a young man that played for us at Virginia, and he says, I’m certain that Charlottesville West will exceed expectations. That was his message to me,” Mendenhall told reporters at the Mountain West Media Days on Thursday.
Mendenhall, who was run off by AD Carla Williams after the 2021 regular season because he wasn’t willing to make a change at defensive coordinator, took the next two years off, recharging his batteries at his farm in Montana as his assistants spread out far and wide across the college football landscape.
His name kept coming up in relation to Power 5 jobs – Stanford and Northwestern were two that he’d been linked to by the dirt sheets – before he did the Bronco Mendenhall thing and shocked everybody by taking the job at New Mexico, which hasn’t had a winning season since 2016.
The guy that Mendenhall is taking over for, Danny Gonzalez, was 11-32 in his four seasons at New Mexico, including a 4-8 mark in his last season, in 2023.
Mendenhall was the defensive coordinator at New Mexico under Rocky Long from 1998-2002, building the innovative 3-3-5 defense around future NFL Hall of Famer Brian Urlacher, before leaving to take the head-coaching job at BYU.
The 3-3-5 that he built at New Mexico more than a quarter-century ago is what Mendenhall uses as his base defense today, with his defensive coordinator from his UVA days, Nick Howell, the one that Williams wanted Mendenhall to part ways with, back with Mendenhall to lead the defense at New Mexico.
Howell is just one of the many former players and assistants from Mendenhall’s UVA and BYU days on the staff at New Mexico.
“We have the most former players of a head coach in all of college football,” said Mendenhall, who has, officially, 14 former players from his BYU and UVA tenures on the UNM staff. “My entire football building is nothing but former players of mine. And I love developing young people. That’s not only players, that’s young coaches as well.”
Other names that would be familiar to UVA Football fans include:
- former UVA QBs coach, Jason Beck as the offensive coordinator.
- former UVA safeties coach Shane Hunter as the special-teams coordinator.
- former UVA assistant offensive line coach Famika Anae as the O line coach.
- former UVA defensive lineman Donte Wilkins as the D line coach.
- former UVA starting QB Matt Johns as the tight-ends coach.
- former UVA cornerback Kirk Garner as the running-backs coach.
- former UVA players Josh Clifford and De’Vante Cross as grad assistants.
- former UVA long-snapper Joe Spaziani as the director of operations.
- former UVA tight end Evan Butts as the director of scouting.
- former UVA defensive end Richard Burney as the assistant director of athletic performance.
“These are people I know, love and trust, and I don’t have time for onboarding or convincing someone this is the way that we’re going to do it,” Mendenhall said. “These guys, I recruited them. They played in my system. They coached in the system. They know me intimately, and vice versa. So, we’re fast, and we’re aligned, and we’re loyal. We’re not perfect, but I’ve seen them every day. It’s a cool place to work.”
It’s not going to be a quick turnaround, but Mendenhall knew that coming in – as he knew what he was getting himself into when he took the job at Virginia in 2016.
“The longest it’s taken to return to postseason in either of the two previous jobs I’ve had as a head coach is Year 2. I prefer Year 1,” Mendenhall said. “We have a lot to do. Sixty new players we’ve added to our roster. Spring practice is over. We have a healthy team coming into Week 0. It’s a long season, three byes, challenging schedule and a lot of unknown still. So, I’m realistic, but also hopeful and believe what we can do, and so I don’t put any limits on what’s possible, but I do acknowledge we have a lot to do in a short amount of time, and the players know that.”
Share
Chris Graham
