{"id":646466,"date":"2026-01-01T21:29:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-01T21:29:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/646466\/"},"modified":"2026-01-01T21:29:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-01T21:29:10","slug":"kyle-whittingham-hiring-byus-jay-hill-as-michigan-footballs-dc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/646466\/","title":{"rendered":"Kyle Whittingham hiring BYU\u2019s Jay Hill as Michigan Football\u2019s DC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">It\u2019s been a busy day for the Michigan Wolverines. Not long after the reported hirings of offensive coordinator <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maizenbrew.com\/football\/101958\/michigan-football-jason-beck-offensive-coordinator-kyle-whittingham-utah-football\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jason Beck<\/a>, wide receivers coach <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maizenbrew.com\/football\/102578\/kyle-whittingham-michigan-football-micah-simon-wide-receivers-coach\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Micah Simon<\/a>, tight ends coach <a href=\"https:\/\/www.maizenbrew.com\/football\/102225\/michigan-football-coach-kyle-whittingham-freddie-whittingham\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Freddie Whittingham<\/a> and quarterbacks coach Koy Detmer Jr., Kyle Whittingham has landed Jay Hill to take over as the defensive coordinator.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">A 50-year-old Utah native, Hill has been the defensive coordinator, associate head coach and safeties coach at BYU since 2022. He coordinated a unit that held opponents to just 19.0 points per game in 2024 and 19.6 points per game in 2025, No. 21 and No. 18 in FBS, respectively, those years. The year prior to Hill\u2019s arrival in Provo, the Cougars allowed 29.5 points per game (97th in FBS).<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Hill was the head coach at Weber State for nine seasons before his time at BYU, compiling a 68-39 record and winning the Big Sky Conference four times. He has a long history with Whittingham as well, serving as an assistant coach under him from 2005-13 and working with him on Utah\u2019s staffs from 2001-04.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Additionally, BYU led the country in interceptions in 2024 (22), and had 30 sacks in 2025, the program\u2019s highest sack total since 2016. Strong defensive play has been a hallmark of Whittingham\u2019s Utah teams, as well as Michigan\u2019s teams over the last decade, and he is clearly prioritizing that side of the ball with Hill coming over to serve as his defensive coordinator.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">On Saturday, Hill helped lead BYU to one last strong performance defensively in the Pop-Tarts Bowl. After the Cougars allowed 21 points in the first half to Georgia Tech, they pitched a shutout in the second half to help secure a 25-21 victory.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Hill replaces Wink Martindale, who was Michigan\u2019s defensive coordinator the last two seasons under Sherrone Moore, marking the official end to the Ravens-style systems we\u2019d seen the last five seasons with Mike Macdonald, Jesse Minter and Martindale. Martindale will now likely look back to the NFL for his next coaching opportunity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s been a busy day for the Michigan Wolverines. Not long after the reported hirings of offensive coordinator&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":632853,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,580,52888,49,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-646466","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-michigan-football","10":"tag-michigan-football-news","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/115821973941364721","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/632853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}