D.J. Eliot named Colorado Buffaloes defensive coordinator

BOULDER – The Colorado Buffaloes have themselves a new defensive coordinator and linebackers coach, his name D.J. Eliot.

Mike MacIntyre announced the news on Thursday as Eliot will arrive in town Friday in time to help Colorado’s recruiting efforts as a dead period ended last week. Eliot will not only take the place of Jim Leavitt in role but also as one of CU’s six multi-year contracts. Tabbed for a three-year agreement that will be submitted for review and approval by the CU Board of Regents.

At 40-years-old he joins the Colorado staff from the University of Kentucky, where he was the Wildcats’ defensive coordinator and linebackers coach for the last four seasons (2013-16) and helped coach UK to the program’s first postseason appearance since 2010.

Eliot played linebacker at the University of Wyoming and he is originally from Edmond, Okla..

Quotes from the press release:

“I’m excited about having D.J. Eliot as our defensive coordinator, he brings a lot of expertise and energy to our defense,” MacIntyre said. “Also he is one of the great, young defensive minds in the game of college football today.”

“I am very excited to work at a great program with an excellent head coach and at a place that has always been special to me and my family,” said Eliot, whose wife is from Westminster and graduated from Northglenn High School.

“We are a 3-4 system that is built to apply pressure on the offense and confuse the quarterback,” Eliot said of his system.

More from the release:

At his past two coaching stops, Kentucky and Florida State, he coached eight players who were drafted in the NFL, including a pair of first round picks. Linebacker Bud Dupree was a 2015 first round selection of the Pittsburg Steelers, Kentucky’s first player selected in the first round in 12 years, and Bjoern Werner out of Florida State went No. 24 overall to Indianapolis after playing under Eliot when he was coaching defensive ends for the Seminoles.

Werner is one of two conference defensive players of the year and All-Americans on Eliot’s resume, collecting the ACC honor in 2012 when he was a unanimous All-American. The first was linebacker Nick Bunting, the 2006 Conference USA Defensive Player of the Year at Tulsa, Eliot’s one season at the school. Brandon Jenkins, a fifth round pick of the Washington Redskins in 2013, exited school at Florida State ranking ninth in school history in career sacks (22.5). He was a preseason All-American entering his senior year before missing the majority of 2012 with a Lisfranc injury.

Overall at Kentucky, he coached 11 Wildcats who earned All-SEC recognition and in three of his four years with the school one of his linebackers recorded over 100 tackles in a season. Avery Williams, currently on the Tennessee Titans roster, was the first in 2013 with 102 tackles and Josh Forrest, now with the Los Angeles Rams, topped that in 2014 with 110 tackles, a figure that ranked No. 3 in the SEC that season.

Eliot got his start in coaching along the Rocky Mountain Front Range at his alma mater, Wyoming, as a graduate assistant in 1999.  From there he went to the University of Houston as a graduate assistant for two years before landing in a similar position at Miami for the 2002 season; the Hurricanes went 12-0 and were ranked No. 1 at the end of the regular season before falling 31-24 in double overtime to Ohio State in the BCS National Championship Game.

That 2002 campaign at Miami is one of many highly accomplished seasons Eliot has seen in his career.  In his second of three seasons at Rice, he helped the Owls go 10-3 and win the 2008 Texas Bowl, the programs first bowl win since 1950 and first 10-win season since 1949.

Eliot helped lead a defensive turnaround at Texas State, as the Bobcat defense went from giving up 34.8 points per game to only 20.3.  Texas State also dropped from allowing 394.6 yards per game to 313.9.

His presence at Florida State also helped lead a revival of FSU’s defense. The year prior to his arrival, the Seminoles ranked 108th in total defense and rushing defense. However, by 2012, FSU ranked second nationally in total defense (254.1 yards per game) and sixth in scoring defense (14.7 points per game).

In his three seasons at Florida State, the ‘Noles went 31-10 and he helped FSU tie for the national lead in sacks with 48 in 2010. In his second season FSU limited opponents to just 2.35 yards per carry, which led the nation in that category. His defensive ends on the 2012 team, Werner and Cornellius Carradine, combined for 24 quarterback sacks and 31 tackles for losses overall when FSU finished 12-2.

At Kentucky, the Wildcats set a new school record for defensive touchdowns scored in a season with six in 2014; UK recorded 23 takeaways that year.  UK jumped 45 places in the total defense rankings from 2013 to 2014 under Eliot, finishing in the top half of the nation in that statistic. In 2015, UK ranked 28^th in the FBS in passing defense by giving up only 198.1 yards per game, the schools best pass defense in five years.