New Tulsa head coach Philip Montgomery says his new role won’t stop him from calling plays and coaching his quarterbacks. That doesn’t mean he isn’t looking for help, though.
Thayer Evans of Sports Illustrated reported Monday that Montgomery had hired Bowling Green co-offensive coordinators Sterlin Gilbert and Matt Maddox to join his staff. The school later announced the hire.
“Both Sterlin and Matt have experience within our offense. They speak the same language that I speak. We see the same things on tape and know exactly how we want to plug in the offense,” Montgomery said in a statement. “Both of these guys bring a vast amount of knowledge, both are very passionate and hard-working guys that will do right by our student-athletes and push them in the direction we want them to go.”
Gilbert and Montgomery have never worked together, but both jumped into college football from the Texas high school ranks, and both got to where they are today by putting points on points on points on points. Montgomery, of course, worked under Art Briles at Stephenville High School, and then Houston, and then Baylor, where he directed an offense that has led FBS in scoring for two years running and ranked among the top four for the last four seasons, which landed him the Tulsa job. Gilbert served as the head coach at Lake View High School in San Angelo, Texas, and then as the head coach at Temple High School before Dino Babers - formerly Baylor’s wide receivers coach, and thus a colleague of Montgomery’s - hired him to run the offense at Eastern Illinois.
Gilbert led FCS in scoring and total offense and was named the FCS Coordinator of the Year by FootballScoop in 2013. He followed Babers to Bowling Green in 2014, where he helped the Falcons put up an 8-6 record this fall.A few years back I asked Montgomery who else runs his offense…his eyes lit up saying Sterlin Gilbert was excellent #AllThePoints #PlayFast
— FootballScoop Staff (@FootballScoop) December 22, 2014
Mattox is also a branch on the Briles/Babers/Montgomery tree. He played and served as a graduate assistant at Houston while the trio was there, and coached the offensive line under Babers and alongside Gilbert at Eastern Illinois and Bowling Green.
Mattox figures to coach the offensive line again for Tulsa, but it is not know where Gilbert, the quarterbacks coach at Eastern Illinois and Bowling Green, will coach.
Either way, expect the Golden Hurricane to light up the scoreboard in 2015.