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Inside The Huskies

Ex-UW Secondary Coach Will Harris Goes from Florida to Miami

He continues to have a lot of people who want to hire him since leaving Montlake.
Dan Raley|
Will Harris, former UW secondary coach, directs his Florida defensive backs.
Will Harris, former UW secondary coach, directs his Florida defensive backs. | Doug Engle/Gainesville Sun / USA TODAY NETWORK

Somber and listless would best describe the University of Washington football team in 2021 after coach Jimmy Lake and offensive coordinator John Donovan were fired with the schedule still in play, several players were lost to season-ending injuries and the losses began to pile up in a hurry.

Yet during those tumultuous times, secondary coach Will Harris was one of the people who tried their best to lighten the mood.

Before the Arizona State game that year in Husky Stadium, with UW players conducting their pregame Dawg Walk to the pulsating beat of "Atomic Dog," Will Harris, wearing a full-length overcoat, strode onto the field and began to dance up one sideline.

It was a reminder to his guys that the game should be fun, that the Huskies needed to pull out of their despair and enjoy themselves. It was reason enough why this extra chic Harris has been considered one of the more popular UW assistant coaches and persuasive recruiters to come through Montlake in recent times.

Since leaving Seattle, Harris, 36, has remained an in-demand coach.

After going to Georgia Southern as the defensive coordinator in 2022, to the Los Angeles Chargers as an assistant secondary coach the following season and to a secondary coach for Florida this past season, Harris on Thursday was hired away by the Miami Hurricanes, according to multiple news outlets.

His departure was met with great surprise within the Gators football program, which only recently had hired a pair of former Husky defensive coaches in Vinnie Sunseri and Robert Bala to become co-defensive coordinators while directing the safeties and linebackers, respectively.

Will Harris works the sideline during a Husky game during the Chris Petersen era.
Will Harris works the sideline during a Husky game during the Chris Petersen era. | UW

A former USC strong safety, Harris played for Pete Carroll throughout his career and earned All-Pac-10 honorable-mention accolades as a senior in 2009.

As a coach, he remains on the fast track to do just about whatever he wants. The players relate to him. Coaches want to hire him, in this case Mario Cristobal. The Huskies won't forget him.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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