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Kris Richard - DC - Printable Version

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Kris Richard - DC - 82lsju - 02-19-2026

Kris Richard has been named Stanford’s Willie Shaw Director of Defense and Couch Family Defensive Backs Coach
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Richard most recently was the defensive backs coach for the Jacksonville Jaguars during the 2024 season. Following their Week 12 bye, the Jaguars held their opponents to just 19.8 points per game over the final six weeks of the season, while their secondary held opposing passers to just 219 passing yards per game, down nearly 60 yards per game from their first 11 games of the season.

Prior to his time in Jacksonville, Richard spent two seasons on staff with the New Orleans Saints, including one season as the co-defensive coordinator in 2022. The Saints had one of the best secondaries in the NFL, allowing just 184.4 passing yards per game in 2022, second-fewest in the league, while holding teams to the ninth-fewest points per game at 20.3. 
...

https://gostanford.com/news/2026/2/18/richard-appointed-willie-shaw-director-of-defense-and-couch-family-defensive-backs-coach

RE: Kris Richard - DC - newguy - 02-19-2026

always nice to have some NFL experience.

RE: Kris Richard - DC - Papa John - 02-19-2026

So he was playing for usc against Stanford in 1999, 2000, 2001? If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

RE: Kris Richard - DC - Griffins78 - 02-19-2026

Does it mean he has been available for awhile and we have been waiting for our first choice at a top NFL team involved in the playoffs but it didn’t work out?

RE: Kris Richard - DC - 2006alum - 02-19-2026

I know nothing about the specifics but I do think they seemed to want to announce all of the coaches together, so I assume some have been known for a little while now.

Eager for the informed views of Squeri and others. As someone who knows next to nothing about football, this seems like a well qualified bunch with the kinds of pro experience many on this board were craving.

RE: Kris Richard - DC - old spanish trail - 02-19-2026

Didn't we recruit him, and he chose SC instead?

RE: Kris Richard - DC - msqueri - 02-21-2026

I like this staff. It's credible, diverse (in numerous respects: NFL/college, old/young, Poly/black/white, Alabama/FCS pedigrees), strongly staffed at the most important coaching positions (QB, OL, and DB), and doesn't have one phase of the game that looks weak/disarmed. There are three big question marks for me. First, the head coach is a novice head coach doing on-the-job training. Second, the hierarchy/playcalling dynamics on both sides of the ball are a bit odd given the coordinators who are more established as position coaches yet having serious coaches below them and an open question (at least for me) how it's exactly going to work in terms of lead playcaller/team dynamic/etc. Third, all of this is pretty marginal if the coaches aren't able to systematically improve the quality of the roster, so what these coaches can do as recruiters may ultimately be more important than how well they can "coach." Thumbnails on how I'm thinking about the individuals:

Pritchard (head coach): Novice head coach who we hope is well-suited to culture building and recruiting. It's all theoretical until he does it.

Heffernan (offensive coordinator): Maybe the hire that does the least for me, as he has less relevant experience than his boss and one of his subordinates and the thing he does have chops in, offensive line coaching, is arguably a less impressive track record than what the designated OL coach brings to the table. The theory has to be a) he fits in as a conceptual piece of the puzzle (likely run game) for a Pritchard-led but cross-functional/teamwork-based playcalling approach and b) we are investing heavily in serious OL coaching, especially from a run blocking perspective. The former gets to my big open question, which I'm anxious about (but I would have been anyway because what it really comes down to is the great unknown of Pritchard as our top offensive coach), and the latter is a big positive deal for me. The arrow up on OL coaching that this staff represents is reason enough for me not to grumble about Heffernan. 

Richard (defensive coordinator/defensive backs): Dated and ambiguous track record as a defensive coordinator as well as being unemployed two of the last three years raise serious questions I won't sweep under the rug but this is a heck of a resume for a program at our level, starting with truly one of the all-time great defensive back coaching resumes in the history of the sport.

Kaczor (special teams coordinator): Not much evidence of a great special teams coach (pretty brutal NFL track record forcing him into the college level) but it's also a hard segment of the game to capture by metrics and, perhaps most fundamentally, Kaczor is a grown-up who's been around the block who we are bringing in to be responsible for a phase of the game that was woeful for us under Reich. At least we have somebody prominently in charge of this. 

Agnew (running backs): I view this job as all locker room and recruiting trail vibes and that's always seemed positive with Agnew. Our depth being challenged by recruiting/admissions whiffs, transfer admission whiff, and Tabb transfer will put Agnew's actual position coaching to the test. Totally fine having him on staff. Good vibes guy, hopefully works like we need all the coaches to work. 

Bratton (wide receivers): The resume of an FCS position coach and NFL assistant position coach does not jump out but the results at both Furman and with the Indianapolis Colts are appealing. Relatively lesser cog in a quietly big-time offensive staff I feel good about, with the oft-repeated question of what we're going to do about playcalling. 

Byham (tight ends): I've never liked this guy. Not a thing about him other than being a nice guy. But being a nice guy goes a heck of a lot farther as our least important coach than as our "offensive coordinator" (what a joke). Like Agnew, being a glue guy and recruiter surrounded by bigger coaches makes a lot more sense than what we tried the last three years. 

Kekuewa (offensive line): This is the one that really fires me up. Very clean trajectory of quality coaching at the NFL level, even better than much of our solid historical track record of such past OL coaches, and coupled with Heffernan there is ample reason to think this augurs well for run blocking in particular. A successful OL coach who has apprenticed in college under Dave Clawson, PJ Fleck, and Brian Kelly and has succeeded in spreading his wings in the NFL coming in to coach on the same staff as another established OL coach is quite a coup/statement by Pritchard. 

Lindgren (quarterbacks): Very credible if unspectacular proven playcaller, which is more than can be said of either guy above him in the hierarchy and introduces questions about how we are going to handle playcalling. At the job he is ostensibly doing, he has a ton of credentials showing the ability to take talent-limited QBs to respectable results, which strikes me as not only exactly what we need but one of the very most important things for our coaching staff writ large to accomplish. 

Mosley (defensive line): Young and compelling personality/worker/recruiter who has proven absolutely nothing as a coach. I like having him on staff for vibes and recruiting, which is not meant as the backhanded compliment it seems because those two things are more important than the "coaching" people usually think about. His actual position responsibility is confusing to me given the far more accomplished DL coach who shows up in the Stanford directory but has not been announced as a coach like Mosley has.

Thompson (inside linebackers): Heck of a first year in major college football last year stepping in as the defensive coordinator and providing a surprisingly good overall defense propelled by his very own position group despite the awful vibes of having been the Taylor crony foisted on the team and staying on after his patron's ouster, so if he can be that good in those circumstances who am I to question his retention in a lesser role?

Whitfield (safeties): He's ok to me but I suspect he gets the benefit of the doubt as a Stanford Man, which I don't think is a healthy dynamic, and I have no particular reason to think he's a great position coach or recruiter. With Richard and Robinson in the mix as well we have a lot of coaching to throw at DB. 


There are also at least two coaches who haven't been officially announced but appear to be in the mix:

Robinson (corners): Robinson is a credible corners coach who, like his patron, we are buying low on at a less than stellar part of his trajectory. Robinson is Richard's guy and that's really the bottom line, one of the great DB coaches vouching for his protege and us hoping that's validated. 

Tuiasasopo (defensive line?): Eagerly awaiting if something gets announced on this (i.e., is this a coach or analyst or what?), as a fully legit Power Four DL coach showing up in our staff directory when the ostensible DL coach is so unproven sure is interesting. Having Tuiasasopo and Mosley mentoring the DL seems positive. I still have no idea what we are doing with OLB/edge coaching. How I ultimately feel about Tuiasasopo depends in part if he's the DL coach or he's just a helper taking a step back from full coaching, but it doesn't change it that much. We have a real DL coach in the program.