Opening comments ...
"I'm Zach Hanson, I'm the tight ends coach here. I'm originally from Linden, Calif., actually, so I'm back home for the first time in my career, which I'm sure excited about. Grew up a USC fan, always dreamed of coming here as a player, all those things, so it's exciting to be back here. Truly just honored to be a part of this program. Thankful to Coach Riley, obviously, as all of us are for bringing us here and allowing us to be part of his staff. If Lincoln Riley gives you a call and asks you to be part of the staff, it takes you about 10 seconds to figure out that you're going to come be a part of it. So, excited to be here."
What's it like to be working in the same program now as your wife, Annie?
"It's really a dream come true, something we've been working towards for about eight years. My wife is our director of recruiting here, we've been at a few stops together, but never with me as a full-time coach and her in her full-time role. Obviously exciting for our family. It's great to be able to live in the same house as your wife -- I know that sounds crazy, but for the past five and a half years we've lived together for about two of them, both kind of chasing our dreams and never wanting to tell each other that you couldn't go do something. True testament to having faith and supporting each other, but a lot of great people helped us along the way too, Coach Riley included in that. Has played a huge role. Grateful to be together here, though."
What's it like going home and talking recruiting with your wife?
"Honestly, Annie's probably been the person that's helped me grow professionally as much as anybody. I have the very distinct honor of being married to somebody in the recruiting world and on the administrative side of things too, and that's helped me a ton. I have dreams of wanting to be a head coach someday, so learning that whole side of things and being able to bounce some things off her has been huge in my development as a coach, especially as a young coach coming up. And I think she would say the same, just having a coach's perspective on things before she gets in that staff meeting and bounces ideas of our whole staff, I'm the first ears to hear it usually. So it's an interesting relationship, I'm sure, to so many people, but it's just become normal to us and something that we're really excited about. As a coach, it's a dream to have the executive director of recruiting as your wife, so she's the one helping you reel in all the talent when it comes that time. But she's awesome. You guys will get to know her too, and she's a tremendous person in our program and somebody who really does a great job for us."
How well did you know Lincoln before this and when he got this job did you immediately start thinking of this possibility?
"I've known Lincoln really well. Annie was one of the first people he hired at Oklahoma, so we built a good relationship over the years. There's been a lot of trust, living away from your family and things. Just trusting that Annie can go to a place and work and be away from each other and there's a lot of people involved in that. Our relationship with Lincoln has been great. He's been awesome every step of the way for both of us. He's been a great mentor to us, he's helped us along the way when we were trying to figure out our paths and all that, so have had a great relationship with him. Obviously, when he got the job here, was not expecting anything -- he's going to hire the best people he sees fit for his staff, and we were in good positions where we were at, but when he gave us that call it was a no-brainer to come here together, be part of a great staff. Which as you guys have probably seen today, a bunch of great people and people that really truly care about developing young men and building culture and doing all those things that this place is ready for."
What is the role of the TE in this offense?
"The tight end plays a huge role in this offense. Looking at the past several years under Coach Riley's offenses, the role has kind of grown, and it's all dependent on personnel and the ability level of the group. But obviously the run game is incredibly important for us, No. 1. You'll hear everybody talk about the run game. Championship teams, you've got to be able to run the ball, so we need guys that can block, but we also need guys that are dynamic out in space and can go make plays. They have to be smart, they have to know the whole offense -- run game, pass game, everything. Everything about it. It's a definite feel position, if I can say that. It's something where you're looking for those guys that have really good football sense, football savvy, can find those little holes in the defense and make some big impactful plays for us."
Is there an ideal type of tight end you're looking for in recruiting?
"Recruiting tight ends is really hard. They're hard to find really good ones. There's a handful every year that have that skill set and there's a lot of projection that takes place. We're looking for multifaceted different kinds of players. You want some longer guys that you can put and be more in-line. You want some maybe more like H-back type bodies in this offense too that won't be your 6-6, 250-pound guy because they need to be able to find their way up through some gaps or go kick out a D-end on a crossblock or something like that. So I think we're looking for multiple different types of bodies. I think the portal can be helpful obviously, but really it's just finding the right guys to come in and fill those roles."
How does being an OL coach previously at Tulsa add to what you bring to the table now at USC?
"Absolutely. There's so many guys, especially in today's college football, they don't learn that whole blocking aspect of it, not to the level they probably should or are expected to when they go to the NFL if that's a dream they have. Unless you're in a true just like two-tight end set all the time just working those techniques, there's a lot of guys that go through making plays in space catching the ball, which is awesome, but then there's a huge development that needs to happen in their first couple years in the league. I think absolutely being an offensive line coach can help me develop these guys as blockers, which in turn will help us offensively. From a pass catching, route running, all that kind of stuff, we do so much stuff with Coach Simmons and Coach Nichol and Coach Riley as a group where there's a lot of hands on deck for every guy that's out there, including my guys, in practice every day. Our guys here will probably catch more balls than they've ever caught at practice every single day, they'll have multiple guys kind of coaching them when they see things, which will help too. Get some feedback from some different people. We've got a great staff here, obviously, with a lot of experience and multi different systems offensively. But yeah, I think being an offensive line coach, at the end of the day, that will help them tremendously with the technique and fundamental part of blocking."
What is your initial assessment of the tight ends you inherit?
"Great kids. Still in the process of learning how each of them click and what their ability level really is with the limited time we've been with them, but really excited about the group I've got. I've got some really good-looking kids. They look the way they're supposed to look. They're big, long, athletic-looking guys that can run a little bit, and they've been great, they've been really sharp in the process and the meetings we've had so far. So really excited about those guys and to see what they can do this spring."
If there was a wrestling match between you and Coach Nua, who would be the favorite?
"I don't know, man. That's a big dude, too. I know I'm a big guy, but it would be a tough one. Me and him are both lovers, we're not fighters anyway, so we'd probably just hug it out and be on the same team. My brother is about the same size as me, we're both 6-8, and we decided at a young age that we weren't going to fight each other because we were going to break too much stuff. So we decided to be friendly and be those guys with each other."
How much overlap is there between an inside receivers coach and tight ends coach?
"To kind of piggyback off that a little bit, a lot of receivers coaches, right? We've got a lot of O-line coaches on this staff too. Coach Henson and obviously I was a former O-line coach, we have a couple of GAs who played O-line, coached O-line. So we've put together a staff, or coach has put together a staff trying to balance all that stuff out. There's definitely going to be some overlap. I think again it comes back to who do we have that can play both of those positions. It takes a special skill set to be able to go get in the backfield potentially as an H-back or tight end and then be able to split out and go be dynamic in space. So when you have those type of players, which we'll have or we will go get, there's going to be some overlap with Coach Nichol and I. But at the end of the day they're going to get to see him quite a bit, and a lot of things we do throughout practice, Coach Riley has his hand on all that stuff too throughout practice and really makes sure they're doing what he wants them to do ultimately so we're all going the same direction."
"I'm Zach Hanson, I'm the tight ends coach here. I'm originally from Linden, Calif., actually, so I'm back home for the first time in my career, which I'm sure excited about. Grew up a USC fan, always dreamed of coming here as a player, all those things, so it's exciting to be back here. Truly just honored to be a part of this program. Thankful to Coach Riley, obviously, as all of us are for bringing us here and allowing us to be part of his staff. If Lincoln Riley gives you a call and asks you to be part of the staff, it takes you about 10 seconds to figure out that you're going to come be a part of it. So, excited to be here."
What's it like to be working in the same program now as your wife, Annie?
"It's really a dream come true, something we've been working towards for about eight years. My wife is our director of recruiting here, we've been at a few stops together, but never with me as a full-time coach and her in her full-time role. Obviously exciting for our family. It's great to be able to live in the same house as your wife -- I know that sounds crazy, but for the past five and a half years we've lived together for about two of them, both kind of chasing our dreams and never wanting to tell each other that you couldn't go do something. True testament to having faith and supporting each other, but a lot of great people helped us along the way too, Coach Riley included in that. Has played a huge role. Grateful to be together here, though."
What's it like going home and talking recruiting with your wife?
"Honestly, Annie's probably been the person that's helped me grow professionally as much as anybody. I have the very distinct honor of being married to somebody in the recruiting world and on the administrative side of things too, and that's helped me a ton. I have dreams of wanting to be a head coach someday, so learning that whole side of things and being able to bounce some things off her has been huge in my development as a coach, especially as a young coach coming up. And I think she would say the same, just having a coach's perspective on things before she gets in that staff meeting and bounces ideas of our whole staff, I'm the first ears to hear it usually. So it's an interesting relationship, I'm sure, to so many people, but it's just become normal to us and something that we're really excited about. As a coach, it's a dream to have the executive director of recruiting as your wife, so she's the one helping you reel in all the talent when it comes that time. But she's awesome. You guys will get to know her too, and she's a tremendous person in our program and somebody who really does a great job for us."
How well did you know Lincoln before this and when he got this job did you immediately start thinking of this possibility?
"I've known Lincoln really well. Annie was one of the first people he hired at Oklahoma, so we built a good relationship over the years. There's been a lot of trust, living away from your family and things. Just trusting that Annie can go to a place and work and be away from each other and there's a lot of people involved in that. Our relationship with Lincoln has been great. He's been awesome every step of the way for both of us. He's been a great mentor to us, he's helped us along the way when we were trying to figure out our paths and all that, so have had a great relationship with him. Obviously, when he got the job here, was not expecting anything -- he's going to hire the best people he sees fit for his staff, and we were in good positions where we were at, but when he gave us that call it was a no-brainer to come here together, be part of a great staff. Which as you guys have probably seen today, a bunch of great people and people that really truly care about developing young men and building culture and doing all those things that this place is ready for."
What is the role of the TE in this offense?
"The tight end plays a huge role in this offense. Looking at the past several years under Coach Riley's offenses, the role has kind of grown, and it's all dependent on personnel and the ability level of the group. But obviously the run game is incredibly important for us, No. 1. You'll hear everybody talk about the run game. Championship teams, you've got to be able to run the ball, so we need guys that can block, but we also need guys that are dynamic out in space and can go make plays. They have to be smart, they have to know the whole offense -- run game, pass game, everything. Everything about it. It's a definite feel position, if I can say that. It's something where you're looking for those guys that have really good football sense, football savvy, can find those little holes in the defense and make some big impactful plays for us."
Is there an ideal type of tight end you're looking for in recruiting?
"Recruiting tight ends is really hard. They're hard to find really good ones. There's a handful every year that have that skill set and there's a lot of projection that takes place. We're looking for multifaceted different kinds of players. You want some longer guys that you can put and be more in-line. You want some maybe more like H-back type bodies in this offense too that won't be your 6-6, 250-pound guy because they need to be able to find their way up through some gaps or go kick out a D-end on a crossblock or something like that. So I think we're looking for multiple different types of bodies. I think the portal can be helpful obviously, but really it's just finding the right guys to come in and fill those roles."
How does being an OL coach previously at Tulsa add to what you bring to the table now at USC?
"Absolutely. There's so many guys, especially in today's college football, they don't learn that whole blocking aspect of it, not to the level they probably should or are expected to when they go to the NFL if that's a dream they have. Unless you're in a true just like two-tight end set all the time just working those techniques, there's a lot of guys that go through making plays in space catching the ball, which is awesome, but then there's a huge development that needs to happen in their first couple years in the league. I think absolutely being an offensive line coach can help me develop these guys as blockers, which in turn will help us offensively. From a pass catching, route running, all that kind of stuff, we do so much stuff with Coach Simmons and Coach Nichol and Coach Riley as a group where there's a lot of hands on deck for every guy that's out there, including my guys, in practice every day. Our guys here will probably catch more balls than they've ever caught at practice every single day, they'll have multiple guys kind of coaching them when they see things, which will help too. Get some feedback from some different people. We've got a great staff here, obviously, with a lot of experience and multi different systems offensively. But yeah, I think being an offensive line coach, at the end of the day, that will help them tremendously with the technique and fundamental part of blocking."
What is your initial assessment of the tight ends you inherit?
"Great kids. Still in the process of learning how each of them click and what their ability level really is with the limited time we've been with them, but really excited about the group I've got. I've got some really good-looking kids. They look the way they're supposed to look. They're big, long, athletic-looking guys that can run a little bit, and they've been great, they've been really sharp in the process and the meetings we've had so far. So really excited about those guys and to see what they can do this spring."
If there was a wrestling match between you and Coach Nua, who would be the favorite?
"I don't know, man. That's a big dude, too. I know I'm a big guy, but it would be a tough one. Me and him are both lovers, we're not fighters anyway, so we'd probably just hug it out and be on the same team. My brother is about the same size as me, we're both 6-8, and we decided at a young age that we weren't going to fight each other because we were going to break too much stuff. So we decided to be friendly and be those guys with each other."
How much overlap is there between an inside receivers coach and tight ends coach?
"To kind of piggyback off that a little bit, a lot of receivers coaches, right? We've got a lot of O-line coaches on this staff too. Coach Henson and obviously I was a former O-line coach, we have a couple of GAs who played O-line, coached O-line. So we've put together a staff, or coach has put together a staff trying to balance all that stuff out. There's definitely going to be some overlap. I think again it comes back to who do we have that can play both of those positions. It takes a special skill set to be able to go get in the backfield potentially as an H-back or tight end and then be able to split out and go be dynamic in space. So when you have those type of players, which we'll have or we will go get, there's going to be some overlap with Coach Nichol and I. But at the end of the day they're going to get to see him quite a bit, and a lot of things we do throughout practice, Coach Riley has his hand on all that stuff too throughout practice and really makes sure they're doing what he wants them to do ultimately so we're all going the same direction."
