Wisconsin football promoted assistant defensive backs coach Jack Cooper to its full-time safeties coach on Monday.
The Badgers had a vacancy after former safeties coach Alex Grinch took the defensive coordinator job at UCF. Cooper will be Luke Fickell’s third safeties coach in as many seasons. Colin Hitschler held the position in 2023 before leaving for a similar role at Alabama.
The rising young assistant joined the Badgers in 2023 as a senior defensive analyst. He was promoted to assistant defensive backs coach entering the 2024 campaign.
Before his time at Wisconsin, Cooper was the defensive coordinator at Rhode Island (Football Championship Subdivision) from 2020-22. He made that jump after two years as a quality control coach at Nebraska (2018-19) and two as a graduate assistant at UCF (2016-17).
Wisconsin is promoting Jack Cooper to safeties coach, a source tells @CBSSports/@247Sports.
Cooper has worked at Wisconsin the last two seasons after three years as the defensive coordinator at Rhode Island. Previously worked at Nebraska and UCF. pic.twitter.com/NSV8pgsMLp
— Matt Zenitz (@mzenitz) December 31, 2024
Wisconsin returns senior Preston Zachman to lead the safety group in 2025. It also added several promising transfers in Matthew Traynor (Richmond, FCS) and Matt Jung (Bethel, D-III). Both players dominated at lower levels — Traynor as a redshirt freshman and Jung as a multi-year starter. The two bring immense potential to a room with significant snaps up for grabs.
Cooper, Zachman and the rest of the unit will be tasked with replicating the room’s 2024 production with star Hunter Wohler at the helm.
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