For Michigan State rush ends coach Chad Wilt, class is now in session

Michigan State co-special teams coordinator/rush ends coach Chad Wilt has held a lot of titles over his more than 20-year coaching career.

In the early 2000s, Wilt was the defensive line coach/special teams coordinator during his tenures at Central Connecticut State, Liberty and Virginia. In the 2010s, Wilt was the defensive line coach at Richmond, Ball State, Maryland, Army, Cincinnati and Minnesota. Most recently, Wilt was the co-defensive coordinator/linebackers coach at Indiana.

Through all of these stops and titles, however, Wilt views that his job has always been fundamentally the same. At his core, Wilt views himself as an educator of young men.

"Coaches are just teachers nowadays," Wilt said earlier this week. "We're just looking for unique ways to teach ... Our meeting rooms, they are all just classrooms. Let's teach. Let's be interactive. Let's show things."

As Wilt went into more detail about this teaching philosophy, he got a certain sparkle in his eyes. Wilt is a high-energy guy. He likes to do things differently, and he likes to make things fun. He told a lengthy anecdote where he compared the pass rush to a boa constrictor snake. If he were a professor, he is likely to be the kind of professor whose classes always had a waiting list.

"We were all able to create our own classrooms," Wilt said about his first few days on campus. "They used to have desks and chairs and long tables, and I said, 'I want that out of here.' (Now) we've got these kind-of old-school chairs with a folding arm, but it's on wheels."

In the space created by removing tables and traditional chairs, Wilt brought in pop-up bags and hand shields in an attempt to create a more dynamic and interactive teaching environment. One media member even commented that it sounds like a Montessori approach to coaching. Wilt agreed.

"I can sit here and show you on film," Wilt said. "I can draw it on the board. But sometimes the best way to do things is stand up and do it ... (When you do that) you're changing the flow of the meeting. You're changing the routine of the meeting and the attention spans and all sudden you're creating this up and down, move around, right? Let's talk. Let's engage."