Dickey to bring offensive attack to USU football
USU has hired Darrell Dickey, formerly head coach at North Texas University, as the new offensive coordinator.
“Darrell brings a lot of Division I experience to the staff,” USU Head Coach Brent Guy said. “I have known him since our playing days in the old Big Eight Conference when he was the quarterback at Kansas State and I was at Oklahoma State.”
Although Dickey’s overall record at North Texas is 42-64, he enjoyed a run of four straight Sun Belt Conference Championships, outscoring foes by an average of 15.6 points per game. Two players, Patrick Cobbs and Jamario O’Neal, led the NCAA in rushing in back to back years while playing for Dickey.
Some other stops Dickey has made in his coaching career include offensive coordinator at Memphis, UTEP and SMU. Additionally, he was tight ends coach at LSU and began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Texas A&M.
“I am very excited to join the USU family,” Dickey said. “I have talked to a number of people that have coached at Utah State and lived in Cache Valley, and they were unanimous about what a great place it is to live and work. Having coached against the Aggies in the past, I know the potential of the program, and after length discussions with coach Guy, I strongly believe in how he is going about building the program. I am looking forward to being a part of Utah State football.”
At Kansas State, Dickey led the Wildcats to the 1982 Independence Bowl, the school’s first-ever bowl game. In his tenure, 70 players were named to all-Sun Belt teams.
Dickey went 3-8, 2-9 and 3-8 in his first three seasons at North Texas. In 2001 the Mean Green lost their first five games, and it appeared Dickey would be fired. His team responded by winning their next five in 2001 and beginning a streak of 26 straight Sun Belt Conference wins. The Mean Green went to four bowl games in this time frame.
“His success at North Texas speaks for itself. He has a great reputation in the state of Texas,” Guy said, “and we have already had good interaction with the high school coaches down there, so he will be a great asset for us in recruiting the state of Texas.”
Dickey has had some health problems recently, suffering a heart attack, having his gallbladder removed and being diagnosed with diabetes within nine months.
After a 2-9 season in 2005 and a 3-9 record in 2006, Dickey was fired by North Texas.
“Darrell knows our situation because it is the exact situation he had at North Texas,” Guy said. “They played a difficult non-conference schedule and then got into conference play.”
Dickey is the son of Jim Dickey, Sr., who was head coach at Kansas State, Florida and Southern Mississippi. Dickey is married and has a daughter.
-graham@cc.usu.edu