Chris Wilson - Football Coach - University of Colorado Athletics

Houston

Sep 12 (Fri)

5:30 PM

Chris Wilson

Title:
Defensive Coordinator/Defensive Line
Email:
footballscouting@colorado.edu
Phone:
303-492-9787

Chris Wilson joined the Colorado staff for the second time on February 29, 2020 as defensive line coach, returning with new head coach Karl Dorrell in a homecoming of sorts back to Boulder, where he coached the defensive line under Gary Barnett for five seasons from 2000-04.

Dorrell announced that he promoted Wilson to defensive coordinator on Jan. 29, 2021; he continued to coach the defensive tackles and ends. Ahead of the spring in 2022, Wilson shifted to coaching the outside/edge linebackers.

Wilson, 53, spent the 2019 season as a defensive assistant with the National Football League’s Arizona Cardinals, and from 2016-18, he was the defensive line coach for Philadelphia under head coach Doug Pederson, where in 2017, the Eagles won the NFC East with a 13-3 record and defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LII.

In all, he has coached 20 years at six different schools on the FBS level, with those teams posting 15 winning seasons in earning as many bowl berths and compiling a won-lost record of 145-93.

Wilson coached All-Big 12 performers Justin Bannan and Tyler Brayton at Colorado, the latter of whom also earned third-team All-America honors, along with other familiar names to CU fans like Marques Harris, Matt McChesney, Brandon Dabdoub, Gabe Nyenhuis and James Garee. He was on the staff that won three Big 12 Conference North Division titles (2001, 2002, 2004) and the 2001 Big 12 Championship, when the Buffs narrowly missed finishing second in the BCS Standings which would have earned CU a berth into the title game.

He left the CU staff after the 2004 season to join coach Bob Stoops at Oklahoma, his alma mater. He was the defensive ends coach for the Sooners for 2005-06, and added special teams coordinator to his duties there the next three seasons (2007-09). He was on the Sooner staffs that won the 2006, 2007 and 2008 Big 12 titles, the latter team earning its way into the BCS Championship game where second-ranked OU fell to No. 1 Florida, 24-14.

Wilson moved on to Mississippi State, where he was the co-defensive coordinator and line coach in 2010 before taking over the sole coordinator role the next two years (2011-12). He went on to coach the defensive line at Georgia in 2013 and then at Southern California (2014-15) before taking the similar position for the Eagles in the NFL. At USC, the Trojans won the 2015 Pac-12 South Division title but lost the league’s title game to Stanford.

He began his coaching career at Indiana State as a graduate assistant in 1993, and was promoted to linebackers coach the following season. He was the outside linebackers coach for Northern Illinois (1995) and the defensive coordinator and line coach at Northeastern (Okla.) A&M in 1996 before returning to Indiana State as its OLB coach in 1997. He then moved on to become the defensive line coach under Todd Berry at Illinois State for two seasons (1998-99), with the Redbirds earning its first-ever playoff appearance his first year there and then posting an 11-3 mark his second year, as ISU won the Gateway Conference title and advanced to the Division I-AA semifinals.

In January 2000, Berry was named the new head coach at Army, and Wilson originally accompanied him to West Point. But in May of that year, CU’s defensive line coach at the time, Buddy Wyatt, left for Texas A&M and Barnett subsequently hired Wilson at Colorado.

A four-year letterman at linebacker for Oklahoma from 1988-91, he was a two-time team captain, recorded 303 tackles, was a three-time second-team All-Big Eight Conference performer, a third-team All-American as a junior and was on the watch list for the ’91 Butkus Award. He was recruited by and initially played for Hall of Fame head coach Barry Switzer, finishing his career there under coach Gary Gibbs. Ironically, some of his top career games came against Colorado, as he had 11 tackles, a pass broken up and a forced fumble in the ’89 game in Norman won by CU, 20-3 (he was OU’s Big Eight defensive player of the week nomination). He had nine tackles in the ’90 game in Boulder and led the Sooners with eight stops in the ’91 contest, again both games won by the Buffs; in all three, he was chasing CU quarterback Darian Hagan, of whom he is now working with on the same coaching staff.

He was a 12th round draft pick by the Chicago Bears in the 1992 NFL Draft and went to camp with the team, but didn’t make the final roster. The NFL would be kind to him down the road, however, as he served three minority coaching internships in the league with Dallas (1995), Arizona (1997) and Miami (1998).

Wilson was born January 8, 1969 in Dallas, Texas, and graduated from Richardson (Texas) High School, where he lettered in football and track. He is married to the former Tina Brown, and they have two grown children, son Caleb and daughter Colby. His hobbies include collecting old music, particularly jazz.

AT-A-GLANCE—He has coached in 376 games as a full-time coach, including 307 in college (250 in Division I-A/FBS, 48 I-AA/FCS, 9 JUCO), and has coached in 15 bowl games (2002 Fiesta, 2002 Alamo, 2004 Houston, 2005 Holiday, 2007 Fiesta, 2008 Fiesta, 2009 Orange/BCS Championship, 2009 Sun, 2011 Gator, 2011 Music City, 2013 Gator, 2014 Gator, 2014 Holiday, 2015 Holiday, 2020 Alamo). He coached in 69 NFL games (53 Philadelphia, including five postseason, 16 Arizona).

COACHING EXPERIENCE

1993	Indiana State	Graduate Assistant (Defense)
1994	Indiana State	Linebackers
1995	Northern Illinois	Outside Linebackers
1996	Northeastern (Okla.) A&M	Defensive Coordinator / Defensive Line
1997	Indiana State	Outside Linebackers
1998-99	Illinois State	Defensive Line
2000	Army	Defensive Line
2000-04	Colorado	Defensive Line
2005-06	Oklahoma	Defensive Ends
2007-09	Oklahoma	Defensive Ends/Special Teams
2010	Mississippi State	Co-Defensive Coordinator / Defensive Line
2011-12	Mississippi State	Defensive Coordinator / Defensive Line
2013	Georgia	Defensive Line
2014-15	Southern California	Defensive Line
2016-18	Philadelphia (NFL)	Defensive Line
2019	Arizona (NFL)	Defensive Assistant
2020	Colorado	Defensive Line
2021-	Colorado	Defensive Coordinator / Defensive Line