SEWARD, Neb. – The full-time Concordia University football coaching staff is now complete. Head coach Patrick Daberkow and the program have announced the promotion of Wes Coomes, who worked on previous head coach Vance Winter’s staff for the past two seasons as a graduate assistant. Coomes will serve as the head junior varsity coach as well as the varsity special teams coach and as the program’s recruiting coordinator. Outside of football duties, Coomes will perform event management for home track and field meets beginning next school year.
Back on Jan. 23, Concordia filled assistant coaching staff positions with offensive coordinator Thomas Byrd and defensive coordinator Corby Osten. Byrd most recently worked as the offensive line coach at New Mexico Highlands University. Meanwhile, Osten just completed his ninth season as an assistant football coach at Concordia.
As a graduate assistant, Coomes coached Bulldog defensive backs in 2015 and 2016.
“To say that I’m excited for this opportunity would be an understatement,” Coomes said. “I’m very grateful to Coach Daberkow and the rest of the staff for providing me with this opportunity. My experience as a GA here at Concordia has prepared me for this moment and has given me a solid foundation to continue to grow and learn from. I cherish the friendships I’ve made and the guidance they’ve provided me with early in my coaching career. We’re putting the work in and laying the foundation with our offseason programs right now to give ourselves a shot at the conference title in 2017. We have the right tools in place to reach our goals. Now it’s just a matter of consistently doing the little things right throughout the offseason to get us where we want to go.”
Over the past two seasons, Coomes has worked closely with first team all-conference defensive backs in D’Mauria Martin and Tarence Roby. The 2015 defensive backfield helped the Bulldogs to national rankings of third in fewest passing yards allowed per game (144.0) and fifth in pass efficiency defense (96.7). This past season, Concordia limited opponents to 182.6 passing yards per game.
Daberkow has observed many strengths in Coomes while working with him the past two years. Coomes is expected to move to the offensive side of the ball and coach running backs.
“Wes is one of the most organized coaches I’ve ever been around,” Daberkow said. “He’s well deserving of this promotion. I’m excited about adding him to the staff. He had some other coaching options. He’s top notch. He has a good relationship with our players and with other staff on campus. We want to build this football program around accountability, toughness and authenticity and he fits all of those things.”
A graduate of Ottawa University, a member of the NAIA’s Kansas Collegiate Athletic Conference, Coomes earned his degree in sports administration after transferring from Dodge City Community College in Kansas. The Phllipsburg, Kan., native twice earned all-conference recognition at Ottawa and led the Braves to a pair of NAIA playoff appearances. Coomes is working on completing his master’s in sports administration from Concordia.
Daberkow will also carry over many of the part-time staff members from last season (see staff list below). He is still looking to hire two graduate assistant coaches for this fall.
2017 Concordia football coaching staff
Patrick Daberkow, Head Coach
Thomas Byrd, Offensive Coordinator (Offensive Line)
Corby Osten, Defensive Coordinator (Defensive Line)
Wes Coomes, Special Teams/Recruiting Coordinator/Head JV Coach (Running Backs)
Reggie Corbin, Wide Receivers
Courtney Meyer, Specialists
Karl Miller, Defensive Backs
Harold Pester – Tight Ends
Chris Shipley – Linebackers