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EAST LANSING - William Peagler has been regarded as a rising prospect in the college coaching ranks for several years.
His full-blown test drive under Mel Tucker last year at Colorado solidified the feeling that he was ready for a call-up.
Peagler, 34, was director of offensive quality control last year at Colorado, and received that call-up from Tucker in February when MSU’s new head football coach invited him to become running backs coach for the Spartans. Peagler jumped at the chance to be a full-fledged, on-field assistant at Michigan State University.
“This place sells itself,” Peagler said during a teleconference on Wednesday. “It’s one of the rare schools. The term ‘Running Back U’ gets thrown around kind of loosely, but Michigan State can make an argument to be one of those top 10 programs as far as production at the running back position in the last 15 to 20 years.”
Peagler began last season focusing on assisting quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator Jay Johnson. But when Colorado running backs coach Darian Hagan had to sit out for nearly two months for undisclosed reasons, Johnson and Tucker turned to Peagler to pick up the slack.
“We had a situation come up where Coach (Mel) Tucker and Coach (Jay) Johnson decided to move me on the field and I coached the running backs throughout all the fall camp, and the first four games of the season,” Peagler said. “I was able to go out on the road and recruit, and I think Coach Tucker was able to see me in a little different light, being able to go out and recruit. He got to see me in position meetings with those guys, teaching, developing and doing all those things on the field.”
Johnson had worked with Peagler in various roles at Georgia, Minnesota and Louisiana and gave the young coach a strong endorsement.
“I lean on Coach (Jay) Johnson a lot,” Peagler said. “I’ve been around Coach (Jay) Johnson, I think this is our sixth year together. He’s a guy that I look up to, he does things the right way.”
When Tucker put together his offensive staff at Michigan State, the Johnson-Peagler tag team was one Tucker wanted to keep intact.
At Colorado, Peagler helped prepare and develop a young stable of running backs into a solid, functional outfit last year. The Buffs ranked No. 5 in the Pac 12 in rushing at 150.3 yards per game. They were led by a sophomore with 874 yards and a true freshman with 441.
“We played a lot of young kids at Colorado last year,” Peagler said. “I don’t think we had a single senior in the running back room. I think the oldest guy was actually a sophomore, so he (Tucker) got to see me develop those guys and I think put a pretty productive product on the field.”
THE RECRUITING PIECE
As an offensive quality control coach or graduate assistant at previous stops, Peagler has always had a hand in on-campus recruiting. Peers could see he had an enthusiastic flair for the sales game of college football recruiting.
Peagler was born in Camp Lejeune, N.C., attended high school at Holly Hill (S.C.) Academy and graduated from Clemson after spending four years as a student assistant. He has aided in the recruiting game at every level of his coaching career.
He was a graduate assistant for two years at Georgia when Kirby Smart, with help from defensive coordinator Mel Tucker, went on a recruiting rampage. In 2018, Georgia signed Rivals.com’s No. 1-ranked recruiting class, and Tucker was listed among the Top 25 recruiters in the nation by Rivals.com. Peagler helped with on-campus visits, assisted Tucker and Smart when he could, and took notes.
As a quality control coach at Louisiana-Lafayette, Minnesota and Colorado, Peagler’s infectious personality as an on-campus recruiter helped those programs. Louisiana signed the top recruiting class in the Sun Belt Conference in 2013. Last year, Colorado had its best recruiting class since 2008. Peagler spent part of the fall on the road as a full-fledged recruiter, and the rest of the year focusing on on-campus recruiting.
In 2010, at the age of 25, Peagler spent at year as tight ends coach at Valdosta State. In 2014, he was running game coordinator and recruiting coordinator at Coffeyville (Kan.) Community College. In between, he spent three years at Louisiana as a graduate assistant and an offensive quality control assistant. By the age of 30, he had a full introduction to the recruiting game and then headed to the major conferences.
“Really the only limitations you have from a GA/QC standpoint in recruiting is you can’t go out on the road and recruit,” Peagler said. “That’s probably the piece that I’ve been missing, at least perception-wise. I coached junior college football at Coffeyville Community College and I coached at Jones Junior College and I coached at Valdosta State, so I’ve got the experience going on the road and getting to see all these coaches and going through that whole process. But Georgia was the best example. What I learned there was that recruiting is everything. Obviously we want to develop our program and all that and we’re going to develop the kids and all that stuff, but if you don’t recruit good players, you’ve got no chance. The best move I ever made in my career was being a G.A. at Georgia.”
Tucker was there too.
“Coach Tucker is constantly recruiting,” Peagler said. “The ultimate piece in this whole thing is recruiting. It never ends, it never ends, it never ends. It’s hard to not want to work for a guy like that. He makes it easy and I’m proud to call him a friend and I’m excited about the future here. People talk about recruiting every day, and he (Tucker) lives it.
“Coach Smart, he’s phenomenal in a lot of different ways, but the thing that stood out to me the most is you have to recruit every single second of every single day. That’s the best thing I’ve learned from the last 15 years, is you have to recruit.”
Fifteen years is a lot of experience for a 34-year-old coach.
“A lot of people see me as a young coach, but I really don’t think I’m a young coach,” Peagler said. “I’ve been coaching since I was in college as an undergrad at Clemson. So, I’ve been coaching since I was, I think, 20-years-old.
“Maybe in terms of the Division I experience I’m a little limited, but I think I am pretty experienced because I’ve been in all type of different situations and worked with a lot of good football coaches that I’ve leaned on through the years. The inexperience piece doesn’t really concern me just because I’ve been around the right people and I think ultimately, I’m ready.”
Tucker does too. The second-year head coach and the young running back coach like each other’s style.
“Ultimately, why I came here, I mean Coach Tucker kind of sells himself,” Peagler said. “He’s real, truthful. He tells it like it is. There’s not a lot of fuss with him, and I appreciate that.
“I was obviously at Georgia with him and he’s the same guy he was back then that he is today. Nothing’s changed. He’s relentless. He says that quote a lot, but he is high-velocity and about what he talks about.
“I think when you’re around him and our players are around him, you feel that, and it’s easy to get on board with him and support him.”
EARLY SWINNEY IMPACT
Peagler learned during his college years at Clemson that genuine sincerity has a place in football coaching.
“I got to witness the transition from Coach (Tommy) Bowden to Coach Swinney,” Peagler said. “My last year was Coach Swinney’s first year as the head football coach. He was the receivers coach and I knew him obviously in that role.
“Probably the number one thing I learned from Coach Swinney is be true to who you are. You watch him publicly, what you see is truly what you get. A lot of coaches, I feel like, kind of try to put out a façade of something that they are not. But he’s very truthful and when he says family he means it. I mean I think he coached his kids’ little league team when I was there. Two of his kids are playing football there now. But the best thing I learned from Coach Swinney is be true to who you are and to get to know the people involved at all levels.”
Peagler is young, but he already has a vast frame of reference.
“As you are growing in any profession, you take little things that you learn here and there and you kind of apply them to what works best for you,” he said. “I’ve been so fortunate. I didn’t play college football, but I was a student assistant at Clemson for four years. I was a GA at UL-Lafayette with Mitch Rodrigue, I coached tight ends at Valdosta State. I got to learn from Kirby Smart, Tracy Claeys when I was at Minnesota and different people.”
The Gophers went 9-4 and beat Washington State in the Holiday Bowl that year, with Johnson as the offensive coordinator.
“No one is going to be successful unless they are around the right type of people and I feel like I have been around the right type of people and have learned little things from each,” Peagler said. “I think the ultimate thing that I’ve learned in this profession is you always have to be ready when your opportunity comes and I think part of why I’m sitting here right now is because I was ready when my opportunity came at Colorado and I proved to Coach Tucker that I was ready.”
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* Tucker optimistic during Detroit TV appearance
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