Starkville - Newly hired Mississippi State head coach Jeff Lebby made two additions to his offensive coaching staff Wednesday evening.
ESPN's Pete Thamel reported that North Texas' Jon Cooper and Oklahoma's Matt Holecek would be joining Lebby's staff. Cooper served as the offensive line coach at UNT and Holecek was the assistant quarterbacks coach at OU.
Cooper coached with Lebby for two seasons at UCF, where he served as the team's tight ends coach from 2018-2019, which was also his first on-field coaching role. Their roots go back to Oklahoma where Cooper was a four-year starter at center for the Sooners from 2005-2008, blocking for Heisman Trophy winner Sam Bradford and future Hall of Fame running back Adrian Peterson.
Cooper spent four seasons in the NFL with the Minnesota Vikings and Tennessee Titans before returning to OU as a graduate assistant in 2013. He spent a year as a graduate assistant at Utah State in 2015 before becoming an analyst at Missouri for two seasons beginning in 2016.
In 2020, Cooper served as the tight ends coach at Arkansas and he spent the 2021 season as the offensive line coach at Western Carolina. Cooper returned to Oklahoma in an analyst role in 2022 before becoming North Texas' offensive line coach this season, where his Mean Green ranked #4 among AAC teams in run blocking and #8 in pass blocking according to PFF.
Holecek has coached alongside Lebby at Oklahoma as the assistant quarterbacks coach for the past two seasons. Under Lebby and Holecek, Dillon Gabriel was one of the most prolific passers in the Big 12 conference. Gabriel led the Big 12 with 3,360 yards and 30 touchdowns this season, and was second with 3,163 yards and 25 touchdowns in 2022.
A 2018 Missouri graduate, Holecek spent the 2019 season with the Tigers as an offensive analyst before joining Lebby at Ole Miss in 2020. With Ole Miss, quarterback Matt Corral finished seventh place in Heisman voting in 2021 while the Rebels finished with a top 25 scoring offense in back-to-back seasons.
Both Cooper's and Holecek's roles have not officially been announced, but is expected that Cooper will work with either the offensive line or tight ends with Holecek working with quarterbacks. Also on Lebby's staff is wide receivers coach Chad Bumphis and defensive line coach David Turner, who were retained from Zach Arnett's staff.
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