It’s Official: Defensive Line Coach Tony Tuioti Leaving Nebraska for Oregon

It’s official Tony Tuioti is leaving Nebraska.

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This move has been rumored for a few days and now we are just waiting for the statement from the athletic department.

Tony Tuioti will be leaving Nebraska after three seasons to move west to Oregon. Tuioti joined Frost’s staff three seasons ago (2019) after Mike Dawson left to coach the New York Giants outside linebackers.

Tuioti has shown to be a very good young coach and one that Nebraska tried hard to keep. However, he is a Hawai’i native and moving to Oregon gets him a lot closer to home.

We wish Coach Tuioti well in his new position! (Unless Nebraska plays Oregon and doubly so when they play Colorado.)

Possible Scenarios for Filling Out the Husker Coaching Staff

It’s more than likely that Mike Dawson will slide in to replace Tuioti as the defensive line coach. The question will be whether he has both tackles and outside linebackers. This past year we saw the outside linebackers lined up more as defensive ends. If that continues Dawson can coach both positions.

Another option would be to have Chinander take over the outside linebackers as he has coached the position while he was at Oregon.

The nickel position could be more interesting. Nebraska could have those couple of players join the defensive back room, or they could look to promote analyst Bill Busch to special teams coach and take control of the nickel position.

This may be one reason it has taken some time to fill the running back coaching position as well. If Tuioti had stayed, Scott Frost might have been looking toward someone who could take both the RBs and special teams. Losing a defensive coach gives him a chance to reshuffle and open up a spot for a dedicated special teams coach + hire a dedicated RB coach.

We should know more soon.