Once at top of football’s coaching profession, Steve Wilks begins new path at Missouri

Every career move Steve Wilks made led him to the top of his profession — coaching football.

It’s been a textbook ascension of small colleges to large, position coach to coordinator, colleges to the NFL. The payoff came in 2018, when the Arizona Cardinals hired Wilks as their new head coach.

But the gig lasted only one year. Plenty has to go wrong for an NFL team to finish 3-13, and it did for the organization and Wilks, who became the 10th NFL head coach since 2000 to lose his job after one season.

Another season in the NFL, as defensive coordinator with the Cleveland Browns, lasted one season before Wilks, after 14 NFL years, was out of football in 2020.

“Recharging,” is how he put it this week.

A path once so clear had to be redefined, and that process brought Wilks to the University of Missouri, where he has taken control of the defense for second-year head coach Eli Drinkwitz. Missouri is Wilks’ ninth college stop, a list that includes Notre Dame and Washington, but this is his first post-NFL job.

“College wasn’t on the forefront,” Wilks said of considering his next move. “I was trying to find the right fit, being around the right people.”

College connections, some three decades old, created this opportunity. Wilks finished his playing career as an Appalachian State defensive back in 1991. Drinkwitz became the Mountaineers’ head coach in 2019, and it was good business for him to get to know the program’s former players.

Wilks, 51, also kept up with his former school as Drinkwitz was forging a 12-1 record at App State in 2019 — defeating North Carolina and South Carolina along the way — and winning a conference championship and bowl game.

That season earned Drinkwitz the Missouri job.

“A lot of guys that I played with started reaching out to me and saying that the new coach is great and wanted to talk to me, and so he and I connected and just hit it off,” Wilks said. “I would stay in contact with him via text, congratulating him on wins or whatnot. Our relationship started growing from there.”

The other connection Wilks had in Columbia was Tigers defensive backs coach Charlie Harbison. The paths of Wilks and Harbison first crossed in 1993, when Harbison was Wilks’ position coach with the Charlotte Rage, an arena league team in Wilks’ hometown.

Wilks hired Harbison as his defensive backs coach with the Cardinals, and Harbison was with Drinkwitz at Appalachian State two years ago.

It all lined up to make Wilks comfortable enough to return to the college ranks, where he began a career after spending one post-playing year in the banking profession.

Wilks’ first coaching job was at Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, North Carolina, a Division II program where coaches helped line the field, washed uniforms … and dreamed.

Wilks recalled looking at the nearby Charlotte skyline and saying he would work there one day. At a banking office, his friend asked? No, at Ericsson Stadium, now Bank of America Stadium, the home of the NFL’s Carolina Panthers.

That would be a leap from Johnson C. Smith, for sure. But through his friendship with Ron Rivera, who worked with WIlks on the staffs of the Chicago Bears and San Diego Chargers, Wilks was eventually hired by his hometown team. By Rivera, who had become the Panthers’ head coach.

Wilks was an assistant head coach and defensive backs coach for the 2015 Panthers team that reached the Super Bowl and finished with the NFL’s No. 2-ranked pass defense. He was elevated to defensive coordinator the next year when Sean McDermott took the Buffalo Bills job, and Wilks’ unit continued to impress.

Suddenly, he was a hot name in the head-coaching market.

He interviewed for several jobs and landed in Arizona, replacing Bruce Arians, who had announced his retirement. But the Cardinals stumbled out of the gate under Wilks, losing their first two games by a combined score of 58-6. Quarterback Sam Bradford was ineffective; Wilks replaced him with Josh Rosen, but things didn’t get much better.

One season highlight: a solid defensive effort against the Chiefs at Arrowhead Stadium. The Chiefs won that game 26-14, but it marked the first time in Mahomes’ MVP season that he didn’t reach 250 passing yards. He was sacked five times, the most in his career.

The Cardinals’ strong defensive effort that day wasn’t enough for Wilks to keep his job, though. He got word from owner Michael Bidwell after the season that he needed to clean out his desk.

“One thing you have to do is control your own narrative and not listen to what’s being said,” Wilks said. “You became a head coach because you were a good coach and the body of work that you had put in place before.

“I tell people I didn’t succeed in the time frame that I was given. I don’t consider myself a failure as a head coach. I just did not meet the expectations in the time frame. So, it was back to work for me.

“I have nothing but great things to say about the Cardinals organization and Michael Bidwell, because he gave me an opportunity that 31 other teams didn’t. I told him at the time, and I still say, I do wish I had more time to fulfill the obligation. But I’m happy where I am now and hopefully we can have great success here. That’s what I’m banking on and expecting. That’s the reason why I came here.”

At Missouri, Wilks takes over a defense that struggled at the end of a generally successful 2020 season. Mizzou finished 5-5 and featured linebacker Nick Bolton, who is projected as a first-or second-day NFL Draft selection. Replacing Bolton’s play-making skills is a priority for Mizzou.

The Tigers ranked eighth in yards allowed and ninth points allowed in the SEC last fall. There’s room to improve, and Wilks believed that happened during the team’s spring workouts, which ended in late March.

Now it’s all about meetings, finishing the semester and continuing to acclimate to a campus environment that he has enjoyed.

“I will say this, on a personal level,” Wilks said. “I’m like a kid in a candy store now.”

Steve Wilks’ coaching career

1995-96: Johnson C. Smith defensive coordinator

1997-98: Savannah State defensive coordinator

1999: Savannah State head coach

2000: Illinois State defensive backs coach

2001: Appalachian State defensive backs coach

2002: East Tennessee State defensive coordinator

2003: Bowling Green defensive backs coach

2004: Notre Dame defensive backs coach

2005: Washington secondary coach

2006-08: Chicago Bears defensive backs coach

2009-11: San Diego Chargers defensive backs coach

2012-14: Carolina Panthers defensive backs coach

2015-16: Panthers assistant head coach and defensive backs coach

2017: Panthers assistant head coach and defensive coordinator

2018: Arizona Cardinals head coach

2019: Cleveland Browns defensive coordinator

2021: Missouri defensive coordinator