KNOXVILLE — Tennessee football coach Derek Dooley can add hiring another defensive assistant to his to-do list between now and spring practice.
The Volunteers lost their seventh assistant coach since the end of the 2011 season Friday, when Terry Joseph confirmed to the VolQuest and govols247 websites that he was accepting an offer to join Nebraska’s staff as defensive backs coach. UT’s safeties coach and recruiting coordinator did not return a phone call from the Times Free Press.
Neither school confirmed the hire as of Friday night.
Joseph’s departure leaves Jim Chaney and Darin Hinshaw as the only two assistants who were with the Vols last season. Chaney enters his fourth year as offensive coordinator, while Hinshaw will move from the quarterbacks to receivers.
“Sometimes you hate losing them,” Dooley said in January when he had four vacancies to fill. “Sometimes it’s good you lose them because sometimes turnover’s a healthy thing. Either way it’s a great chance to say, ‘Hey, where can we get better through this?’ That’s what we’re going to do.”