Miguel Chavis ready to unleash the lion at prestigious Oklahoma
Miguel Chavis is ready for this opportunity at Oklahoma. After serving in an off-the-field defensive player development role for the past five years at Clemson, Chavis now gets his first crack as a full-time assistant coach.
“Just excitement more than anything. I don’t think anybody has more pressure. I don’t feel anybody’s pressure [other] than my own pressure that I put on myself. But just excitement. I’ve been preparing for this opportunity for a long time,” Chavis said.
Like new co-defensive coordinators Ted Roof and Todd Bates, Chavis brings familiarity with Venables’ defensive system with him to Norman.
“You know, played football under Coach [Dabo] Swinney at Clemson and was in the NFL with the Steelers and the Chiefs long enough to have a cup of coffee, and for the past five years I’ve been in the Brent Venables school of defense, and was coached by a couple of legends in Chris Rumph and Dan Brooks and got to work very closely with Todd Bates. And my first year I had to learn what the heck Coach V was just saying as a support staff person, and then by year three I had a pretty good grasp of the defense. By year four, I felt like a lion in a cage. I was ready to go,” Chavis said.
He turned down other chances to be a full-time position coach before saying yes when Brent Venables offered him the OU defensive ends assistant coaching job. Now, it’s the Sooners that get to see the lion unleashed.
“So, I turned down some job opportunities and was patient, and I just had great counsel, and from Coach Swinney and other people in my life that said, ‘Man, that’s not the one. Just wait. That’s not the one. Just wait.’ And it was God’s perfect timing. And so when Coach V said, ‘Will you go with me?’ It didn’t take me long to say yes,” Chavis said.
All Chavis knew about Oklahoma beyond what Coach Venables said was that the Sooners are accustomed to winning.
“I’m a fan of college football. Right? And yeah, I’m a coach, yeah, I played, but I’m a fan, man. I love the game, and it’s a developmental game. And I appreciate and enjoy and respect what they do in the NFL, man, but I think something is just very, very unique about 18- to 22-year-olds and being able to use the game to invest and mold them. And so with that being said, I watched and understood the landscape of college football, and when I thought about the top of college football and kind of that first tier, I couldn’t think about it without thinking about Oklahoma.
“I mean, you’re talking about one of five teams that have won 100-plus games in the past 10 years, one of four teams that have been to four CFP’s or more since the inception of the College Football Playoff. And so regardless of what anybody thought or my ignorance of maybe the location or the place, like we’re literally in the middle of everywhere. Like, everybody is a national recruit for us, like everybody. You know what I mean? But I knew that, man, you had the Clemson’s, the Alabama’s, the Oklahoma’s and the Ohio State’s. OK? And Georgia’s really, really good, too. And so that’s what I knew about it. And the brand, they were Jordan. I knew that as well. Super dope,” Chavis said.
Again, Chavis felt he was ready for this opportunity, but that didn’t mean the moment when the job was actually offered was any less fulfilling.
“Yeah, I don’t know if my mind was racing, but once again, it was something that Coach V, you get to spend any time around Coach V, you’ll realize how unique of a person he is. And so it was very humbling that the head football coach at the University of Oklahoma would ask me to come be a position coach for him. And so I would just say humbling, the moment more surreal than anything else. But, you know, it’s very humbling, and I’m so thankful,” Chavis said.
It also means the real work has just begun.
“But man, I’ve got a lot of work to do, and so the job and the expectations and the standard, I’ve known it for five years. Just because I’ll be wearing Crimson and Cream doesn’t mean that the standard is any higher or lower. Working for Coach V is very, very demanding, but man, it is so fulfilling. He just makes everybody around him so much better,” Chavis said.
In the meantime, Chavis said he and his family have been settling in nicely to Oklahoma.
“And so the transition has been great. We love Norman. I have a wife of, it’ll be 10 years June 29. We have four kids, six and under, so please pray for us. But man, we’ve been really pleasantly surprised. The only thing I knew about Oklahoma was that they’d won a lot of games and everything Coach V. said about them. So, we came out here just with excitement, ready to get going. But it’s been great so far,” Chavis said.
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Oklahoma Sooners, Brent Venables finalize coaching staff for the 2022 season
