Tate delighted he's still at UTC

Fred Tate was one of two assistant coaches retained in early January by new University of Tennessee at Chattanooga football coach Russ Huesman. The other was Jason McManus.

Tate, the defensive line coach, had no previous ties to Huesman, unlike many of the new men filling the offices around him.

Huesman, a UTC graduate and former University of Richmond defensive coordinator, worked with new Mocs defensive coordinator Adam Fuller and offensive coordinator Marcus Satterfield at Richmond. Offensive assistant Will Healy played at Richmond, and defensive line assistant Marcus West played for Huesman at the University of Memphis.

Offensive line coach Russ Ehrenfeld played with Huesman at UTC.

"It was a little different because there were all these connections between Russ and the guys he brought in," Tate said. "I've been coaching a while now, and I've been in situations like that before."

Tate, hoping to keep his job and keep his family in Chattanooga, didn't wait for the new coach to be named before trying to establish contact.

"In the coaching search process, if you're a guy that's trying to remain somewhere, you do your research and try to get to the candidates and let them know you're interested," he said. "And when it boiled down to (Huesman) was going to get it, I had some people that knew him that I had worked for, and I think he knew who I was from his days at Memphis."

The search was a stressful time, Tate said, because of the uncertainty involved. If an offer comes along, do you risk turning it down because you think you might get a better one? What if your phone never rings?

"You sit there and you don't know. There's so much uncertainty," he said. "You've got about 15 irons in the fire and then one by one they all fall through, and then the one that you least expect sometimes is the one that comes through for you. Me not knowing Russ, I felt like it was a long shot for me to stay here."

The long shot paid off and now Tate is working under a defensive-minded head coach who two nights before he took the job helped Richmond win a national championship.

Tate was one of four new defensive assistants on the Mocs' staff last season, and now he's the only returning coach on a defensive staff with four new assistants.

With spring practice behind him and the start of the preseason just a month away, Tate said the transition has gone as well as possible.

"It's been very smooth, especially coming in with a guy like Russ that's got a defensive mind," he said. "I'm glad I was able to stay here, and I feel very blessed to be a part of the Chattanooga football program."