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Report: Oklahoma RB Coach DeMarco Murray Again a Candidate for Big Ten Job

Last year he flirted with Ohio State's job opening, and he's apparently under consideration at another B1G powerhouse.
John Hoover|
Oklahoma running back coach DeMarco Murray
Oklahoma running back coach DeMarco Murray | Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

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Oklahoma Sooners

For the second year in a row, Oklahoma running backs coach DeMarco Murray is apparently a candidate for the same position at a Big Ten powerhouse.

Last year, Murray was considered for the same position at Ohio State.

On Tuesday, On3’s Pete Nakos reported that Murray is now a candidate for the open position of running backs coach at Penn State.

In January, Murray got a raise from $500,000 to $575,000 and a contract extension through 2026. Then in March, after Ohio State looked into hiring Murray, Murray got another raise of $225,000, bumping his annual salary to $800,000 for 2024. He's now set to make $2.525 million over the term of his contract.

“DeMarco has been in high demand,” head coach Brent Venables said in July.

Following his NFL career, in which he was named AP Offensive Player of the Year and won the NFL rushing title, Murray spent a year in broadcasting before becoming a coach at Arizona in 2019. 

The Sooners’ all-time leader in career touchdowns and career all-purpose yards was initially hired by Lincoln Riley in 2020 and has worked for Venables since 2022.

Murray has coached the likes of Eric Gray, who now plays for the New York Giants, and Rhamondre Stevenson, the leading rusher for the New England Patriots, as well as three-time 1,000-yard runner Kennedy Brooks.

He’s struggled to identify a lead running back in each of the last two seasons, however, and the position struggled in 2024 as the offensive line and quarterback were all new and the wide receivers corps was entirely injured.

Last year Murray signed the top running back in the nation in Taylor Tatum, who was third on the team last season with 278 yards and three touchdowns, as well as the No. 1 running back in Oklahoma in Xavier Robinson, who didn’t play until late in the season but still broke out for 233 yards and four TDs.

He also recently signed 4-star Tory Blaylock in the 2025 recruiting class out of Humble, TX, but doesn’t have any running back commits yet in the 2026 class or beyond.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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