Nick Sheridan hired as new QB Coach

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A source tells CoachingSearch that Central Michigan running backs coach Nick Sheridan will join the Indiana staff as quarterbacks coach. Sheridan spent the last three years as a graduate assistant at Tennessee and had recently joined CMU. At Tennessee, he spent two years with new Indiana offensive coordinator Mike DeBord. He also played under DeBord at Michigan. 

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From when Tennessee hired him two years ago:

Trusted Sheridan a good fit for Vols staff, QBs

Before the dreams of becoming a starting quarterback in college, or even thoughts of wanting to play in the NFL, Nick Sheridan looked at his father, Bill, and the men who surrounded him and knew he wanted to be, above all else, a football coach.

"When I grew up, of course I had idols like the great quarterbacks Brett Favre, Tom Brady and those guys, but really my heroes growing up were coaches, and of course my dad was the No. 1 hero," Sheridan told VolQuest.com this week. "But all my dad's coaches that I grew up with, I respected and thought the world of them, too. I knew one day I wanted to be a coach.

"So I've known since, shoot, probably eighth grade that I wanted to be a coach when my playing days were over, that I would get into coaching."

When Sheridan's playing days were barely over; when Zach Azzanni was first becoming an ascending commodity in college football's coaching ranks, Azzanni knew what he saw in the young Sheridan, a coach's son and former Michigan quarterback with football fibers, as Azzanni steered a Western Kentucky offense that sparked one of college football's biggest turnarounds in 2011.

"He's lived around the game his entire life. Coaches hire guys they trust; I trusted him to help me in my first offensive coordinator job to be my right-hand man," Azzanni told VolQuest.com, "and he was instrumental in us having the biggest turnaround that year in college because he helped develop our quarterbacks. And I believed very strongly in him, so much so that I encouraged Nick to be hired full-time at Western when I left there."

Aside from the Vols' new offensive coordinator Mike DeBord, Sheridan might be the most-talked about member of Butch Jones' third coaching staff.

Heady stuff for a graduate assistant, though Sheridan's resume is that of a coach on the rise.

Western Kentucky won seven regular-season games each of the two years Sheridan was in Bowling Green, Ky., and he followed coach Willie Taggart to South Florida for a second-straight year as a full-time assistant coach.

With that 2013 season at USF a disaster and Taggart under immense pressure, Sheridan became a casualty in part of five assistant coaches Taggart has fired through two seasons atop the Bulls' program.

Still, Sheridan's pedigree and early track record afforded him options. In Tennessee, he found both familiarity and opportunity.

The culture, he said, was above all most important.

"Basically what happened is after the 2013 season at South Florida, I got let go. There were some other opportunities, but I really wanted two things," said Sheridan, who turns 27 in May. "One, I knew the people here and I kind of made the decision that I wanted to work with people I knew and knew the type of people they were and how I was going to be treated, the work environment I knew I was getting into. All the coaches on this staff are outstanding people. That was important to me, not to say that at my previous places it wasn't.

"Two, Tennessee, obviously a proud tradition here, and I wanted to coach at a place that competes at the highest level. Tennessee has always done that. Certainly the conference we're in, that makes it fun. If you're a competitor, you want to coach in the SEC. Regardless of what your role is in this staff, you want to be a part of that."

Sheridan's role in 2015 will receive more attention, because of DeBord's arrival and because of the burgeoning expectations for rising Vols junior signal-caller Joshua Dobbs.

The reality, as Azzanni noted, is that Sheridan already is a key --- and trusted --- member of the Vols' staff.

DeBord might have been the first new-hire coordinator in SEC history to answer a press-conference question about his graduate assistant, but then again, DeBord's answer made clear yet again Sheridan is no ordinary graduate assistant.

"He's got great knowledge, he's got a great relationship with our quarterbacks, and he and I have gone through everything, every little step, every little --- could be a hand-off, could be a drop --- I mean we've gone through everything so that we're on the same terminology," DeBord said. "We've believed in doing it the same way, but what is that step called? What's that next step called? So, that's got to be the same terminology in that room. ... Nick Sheridan is a great person and a great football coach and one that I'm very thankful to be working with."

Now that both are coaches, Sheridan doesn't overly lean on his veteran father, the Detroit Lions' linebackers coach who won a Super Bowl ring in 2007 as an assistant for the New York Giants and who also coached collegiately at Michigan, Michigan State and Notre Dame, among others.

"We talk, and I'm very blessed; I've got a great relationship with my mom and my dad. We don't always talk football, but that resource is there for me and I use it," Sheridan explained. "That's obviously been a good insight and perspective for me to bounce things off of, just looking at it from a different angle. We'll talk about organization and ways to coach players and organize meetings. All kinds of things. But we don't just talk football; he's my dad and we discuss a lot of things. He's been blessed to coach at a lot of places, under and with some great coaches, and coaches some great players."

Sheridan's maturity matches his coaching philosophy --- which also shows a wisdom beyond his years, especially as DeBord's return to the college game coupled with downhill-snowball expectations pervade Rocky Top.

In other words, don't fixate on Sheridan's age --- or anyone else's for that matter. Sheridan leans on a lifetime of experiences, from those childhood coaching dreams to a Michigan career that spanned walk-on-turned-scholarship-turned-starting-quarterback; then back to the bench and back into the lineup, again.

"I think that (age) sometimes can get overblown; I think great coaches can relate to people from all walks of life, all different ages. I think players at their core, I believe this at all levels, they just want to be helped," Sheridan said. "And if you can help them play better, they'll listen and if what you tell them helps them perform better on Saturdays, whether you're 25 or 65, I think they'll listen. Certainly I like to think that being young and energetic and having a passion for the game, hopefully that will carry over for many years and something I pride myself on.

"I think coaches at all different ages can coach as long as they're helping their players play better."

They're the words of a 26-year-old coach; the philosophy of a guy who's been preparing for this moment for years.

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BIO:

Position:Offensive Graduate Assistant

Alma Mater:Michigan '10

Joined Tennessee in 2014 after coaching at the University of South Florida in 2013 as the Bulls' quarterbacks and passing game coordinator

Also served as quarterbacks and passing game coordinator at Western Kentucky in 2012 under coach Willie Taggart

Served as graduate assistant on offense at WKU in 2011

Prior to joining WKU's staff in the spring of 2011, Sheridan coached quarterbacks at his alma mater, Saline High School in Saline, Mich.

A 2010 graduate of Michigan with a bachelor's degree in political science

Walked on to the Wolverines football team in the fall of 2006, and earned a scholarship prior to his junior season

He saw action in 12 games under center during his career in Ann Arbor, making four starts during the 2008 season

Completed 70-of-148 passes for 701 yards and a pair of touchdowns. In one of those starts against Minnesota, he completed 18-of-30 passes for a career-best 208 yards. In fact, his 236 yards of total offense were the most by a Wolverine during the `08 campaign

Sheridan has grown up as a coach's son. His father Bill is currently the linebackers for the Detroit Lions

[akhosrof 1,168]

I like this move a lot! Played and coached under DeBord. Coached under Taggart also. He was a smaller, scrappy QB himself. I'm sure he'll be a big asset to Ramsey and Tronti. He'll recruit his butt off. Comes from a coaching family with strong Michigan roots. Hopefully he can help us out recruiting Michigan.


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