Clemson Safeties Raved About New Position Coach Nolan Turner. Here's Why

In 2024, former Clemson safety Nolan Turner switched his NFL football pads for a clipboard and a pen, rejoining the program where he made a name for himself to join its coaching staff.

Since then, he’s climbed the ranks of the hierarchy. After two seasons as a defensive player development and assistant safeties coach, Turner is now the position coach of where he played from 2016-21.

And the players currently under him have enjoyed learning under him over the course of this offseason.

Clemson’s safety room is fairly new compared to recent seasons. The Tigers lost Ricardo Jones and Khalil Barnes to the transfer portal, but brought in Old Dominion transfer Jerome Carter III and Southern Miss transfer Corey Myrick to fill the holes. Freshman standout Polo Anderson also joined the program in the spring.

But for returners from Ronan Hanafin, there have been changes that he’s seen from Turner to the previous safeties coach, Mickey Conn. The player and coach worked closely during Hanafin’s transition from wideout to safety in his sophomore season and on.

“He’s a guy that was meeting with me every day, and just making sure I knew just the little things.” he said on Saturday. “I didn’t know much about defense when I switched over and the ins and outs of it.”

Having a former two-year captain at that position surely helps. Turner finished his Clemson career with 259 tackles, 20 pass breakups and seven interceptions in 65 games, starting in 25. That experience has helped Hanafin develop into a physical member of the secondary while seeing the most time he has in his Tiger tenure in 2025.

“But, he was the one that met with me every day and just really helped me progress from not knowing much to being able to play on a game-to-game basis,” he said.

Carter calls him a “swaggy coach”, with the 28-year-old being able to relate to the younger guys after only being three seasons removed from the NFL. It has helped the new safeties gel within the room much smoother.

“He learned the playbook just like us, so he just wants to be the best coach for us,” he said. “He’s a player guy, and he knows what it takes. So, just him finding his voice and talking to us like he’s talked to us, that’s good.”

Being a new coach is a process, but the Clemson safety room will look to fix the woes of what occurred last season. Busted coverages and missed assignments led to big plays allowed for the Tigers’ defense in the first season under defensive coordinator Tom Allen.

That will look to change under Turner, and his new viewpoints, due to the changing times and his previous NFL experience, have the safeties clicking better than ever before.

“He’s very communicative and he really knows how to portray it to guys our age, especially when I was switching,” Hanafin said. “I didn’t know a bunch of the terminology and stuff, and just for him to be able to dumb it down and now, be able to speak on a much deeper level about all that stuff has really helped me a lot.”

“He’s a young dude,” Carter added. “He just came out of the league, so he knows what he’s talking about.”

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