Mike Ekeler

Mike Ekeler (born October 4, 1971) is the Inside Linebackers coach for the Georgia Bulldogs football team. Ekeler previously served as the Linebackers coach for the USC Trojans football team and as the Co-Defensive Coordinator at Indiana.

Biography

Early life

Mike Ekeler was born in David City, Nebraska, a small city in east central Nebraska and graduated from Blair High School in Blair, Nebraska in 1990.

Playing career

Ekeler played both sides of the ball at Blair High School, as a wide receiver and linebacker. The Blair High School team won the Class B Nebraska State Championship in 1988, his junior year.

After the conclusion of his high school playing career, Ekeler played for Kansas State as a linebacker under Bill Snyder from 1991 to 1994, lettering in three of his four years there. Ekeler was appointed as a team captain by Snyder in 1994, and was the only player ever appointed captain by Snyder during the coach's entire seventeen-year head coaching career at Kansas State. Coincidentally, during Ekeler's first year playing at Kansas State, future fellow Nebraska Assistant Carl Pelini was early into his coaching career, putting in his third and final year on the Kansas State coaching staff.

Ekeler concluded his time at Kansas State by obtaining his Bachelor's degree in Social sciences in 1995.^[1]

Coaching career

High Schools

After seven years in private business for himself, Ekeler returned to the game when he began volunteer coaching for V. J. and Angela Skutt Catholic High School in Omaha, Nebraska from 1999 to 2001, and as an assistant coach at Manhattan High School in Manhattan, Kansas in 2002, back in the town where he had played for Kansas State almost a decade before.

Oklahoma

In 2003, Ekeler's first opportunity to rise to the college ranks presented itself when he was invited by Oklahoma Head Coach Bob Stoops to join the staff as a Graduate Assistant, working under Co-Defensive Coordinator Bo Pelini. Oklahoma played for the BCS Championship in both of Ekeler's seasons at Oklahoma, while posting a two-year record of 24-3.

LSU

When Bo Pelini moved to LSU to work under Les Miles beginning in 2005, Ekeler followed and continued working under Pelini as a Graduate Assistant, and success followed. In their first year, LSU finished with national top ten rankings in all defensive categories. In 2006, the LSU squad bested defensive records set in 1976 as LSU led their conference in six defensive categories and ranked nationally in four. 2007 brought even greater success, as Ekeler moved into a position as a coaching intern, and LSU rolled to a 12-2 record and won the BCS Championship, marking the third time in five years that Ekeler had been part of a team playing for the BCS title.

Nebraska

At the conclusion of the 2007 season, Pelini was hired to replace Head Coach Bill Callahan at Nebraska. Many former Nebraska assistants who were let go upon Callahan's hire four years prior were brought back into the program, and being a Nebraska native and also a valued team member at LSU, Pelini brought Ekeler back to his home state of Nebraska, along with a promotion to Linebackers Coach, for the 2008 season. During his three seasons in Lincoln, Nebraska's defensive units consistently ranked in the top ten nationally, and won or shared the Big 12 Conference North Division Title all three years. Nebraska played for the league championship in 2009 and 2010, losing both by a total of only four points, and holding the opponents to a combined 36 points.

Indiana

Following Nebraska's 10-3 regular 2010 season, Ekeler was hired to serve as Linebackers Coach and Co-Defensive Coordinator at Indiana by new Hoosier head football coach Kevin R. Wilson. Ekeler will work alongside former New Mexico Defensive Coordinator Doug Mallory, who served as the other Indiana Co-Defensive Coordinator while also coaching the Safeties. Ekeler had previously worked with Wilson at Oklahoma for 2003 and 2004, when Wilson was the Offensive Line Coach for the Sooners.^[2][3]

USC Trojans

On February 22nd,2013 Ekeler was hired by Lane Kiffin and USC as Linebackers coach.

Georgia Bulldogs

On February 6th, 2014 Ekeler was hired by Coach Mark Richt to serve under defensive coordinator Jeremy Pruitt as the Inside Linebackers coach. Ekeler inherited the position coached the previous years by Kirk Olivadotti. ^[4]

References