Look up Midwesterner in the dictionary, and the biography of Tommy Rees easily could appear.
Alabama’s new offensive coordinator grew up in the Chicago suburb of Lake Bluff, played quarterback at Notre Dame, got his first coaching job back in the Chicago area as a Northwestern graduate assistant, then spent the past six seasons as Notre Dame’s quarterbacks coach, including the last three as offensive coordinator as well.
So when Rees accepted Nick Saban’s offer in February to venture to the Deep South, he and his fiancée experienced the expected first impressions.
“It’s hotter down here,” Rees said earlier this month in a news conference. “We learned that pretty quickly. When we moved into our house, we had about 10 neighbors come by and drop off baskets, and that’s something that hasn’t happened to me before.
“The thing that I resonate most with is the love and the passion here for football.”