Pat Fitzgerald's under-the-radar coordinator hire could go long way in rebuilding Michigan State program

Pat Fitzgerald might have just made the most impactful coordinator hire of the offseason.

It certainly wasn't the biggest move as far as prominent coaches made on Thursday. No, that would be Texas surprising everybody by bringing Will Muschamp back to Austin to be the Longhorns' defensive coordinator (no word on whether it's another head coach-in-waiting situation). In fact, I'm not sure how many people outside of a campus in Iowa really noticed it.

Fitzgerald, who took the Michigan State job this offseason and spent plenty of time around the Iowa football program while unemployed (his son, Ryan Fitzgerald, is a freshman QB on the Hawkeyes), clearly saw something he liked. That's why he convinced longtime Iowa special teams coordinator LeVar Woods to leave Iowa City and join him with the Spartans. Woods will serve as the special teams coordinator and assistant head coach with Michigan State.

This is a bit of a coup for Fitzgerald. Woods bleeds black and gold. He played at Iowa as a linebacker and was on the team when Kirk Ferentz took over from Hayden Fry. Then, after an eight-year NFL career, Woods returned to Iowa City to begin his coaching career in 2008 and has been on the sideline ever since.

He began helping out on special teams in 2012 when he served as the OLB and special teams coach. Then, he moved on to tight ends for a few seasons while still coaching special teams. In 2017, Woods became the special teams coordinator outright, and Iowa's special teams have been a dominant force since. If you don't believe me, just look at this chart.

TruMedia's database for the EPA only goes back to the 2016 season, but that covers the entirety of Woods' time running the show himself. As you can see, Iowa has blown the competition out of the water in EPA. San Diego State is the only other school that can see their taillights.

Special teams is the most overlooked part of football, but its impact on the Iowa Hawkeyes cannot be denied. It's a team that's been built on defense and special teams. Seriously, if you look at offensive EPA, defensive EPA and special teams EPA since the 2016 season, the results speak for themselves.

It isn't as simple as finding a kicker who can make field goals or a punter who can pin you inside the 10-yard line. It's teaching them how to do it, and then treating every aspect of special teams (coverage units on returns, returns, etc) as if they're just as important as your offensive playbook or blitz packages on defense. Woods has done that at Iowa and succeeded every year.

Now, Fitzgerald is looking to import those results to Michigan State. The hiring of Woods and giving him an assistant head coach title is a statement of intent about how Fitzgerald plans to build his Spartans program. To be clear, simply hiring Woods won't turn the Spartans special teams unit into the Hawkeyes overnight. Nor will Woods' departure pull the rug out from underneath Iowa's superpower. It could help chip away at that lead Iowa has built up over the last decade, though.

You may be thinking that this approach by Fitzgerald is no different than what he did at Northwestern, but the approach and ability to execute are different things. Again, TruMedia's EPA database only goes back to 2016, but for Fitzgerald's final seven seasons at Northwestern, the Wildcats total special teams EPA was 19.80. That ranked 57th nationally and 7th in the Big Ten. Michigan State ranked 11th in the Big Ten during that time and is 14th from 2016 to 2025 (101st nationally).

Another part of special teams that's often overlooked is that in order to be truly good at it, you need athletes. There's a reason you don't see offensive linemen on coverage units. You need players who can fly down the field and make tackles. Well, Northwestern was a bit limited in its ability to get all of the best athletes it desired because of academic requirements.

One of the reasons I'm so high on the Fitzgerald hire at Michigan State is that he'll have greater access to players he didn't have access to before. That will help him on offense, defense and, yes, special teams.

Fans at Spartan Stadium will probably be a lot more excited when the punt teams come out in the near future, and not just because they're hoping Michigan's punter will have trouble with the snap.