Inside The Huskies

Former Husky Safeties Coach Vinnie Sunseri Ends Up at Florida

He originally had accepted a job at Jacksonville State following the Sun Bowl.
Dan Raley|
Safeties coach Vinnie Sunseri offers practice guidance to Tristan Dunn.
Safeties coach Vinnie Sunseri offers practice guidance to Tristan Dunn. | Skylar Lin Visuals

Vinnie Sunseri always was known as an aggressive player for Alabama, as a safety running all over the place and hitting people.

He's since carried that approach over to his coaching career, on Saturday accepting his second job in three and a half weeks since leaving the University of Washington -- going from the Huskies to Jacksonville State to Florida.

Hired as the Gators' safeties coach and co-defensive coordinator, Sunseri will work alongside another former UW assistant coach in Will Harris, who handles the cornerbacks, and will be hands on with ex-Husky safety Asa Turner provided the latter can receive a seventh year of college football eligibility from the NCAA as intended with a medical redshirt.

Sunseri, 33, spent one season in Montlake working on Jedd Fisch's staff after working the four previous years with Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots.

Sunseri steps into more of a coaching pressure-cooker in Gainesville, joining a Florida program that went 8-5 after losing five of its first nine games to greatly unsettle the fan base. He replaces Austin Armstrong, who according to reports was pushed out and has since joined Houston.

Even Sunseri, who played safety for Alabama in 2011-13, won't be given much of a honeymoon period to prove himself with Billy Napier's staff.

Consider this assessment of his hiring by Only Gators: "Why are the Gators overpaying [by title] and hiring inexperienced coaches with limited pedigrees to important positions while rivals and similarly distinguished programs bring in veterans, top assistants from other teams and some of the best names in the industry to fill their roles? Taking six weeks to hire an assistant who should have been readily available when the position initially opened is another curiosity. That either speaks to Napier’s continued paralysis-by-analysis approach when it comes to making hires and other crucial decisions within the organization, or it suggests the opportunity was turned down by numerous other candidates."

For the Huskies, Sunseri's departure marked a temporary blow to Fisch's recruiting pitch of come "Be a Pro," with the coach departing shortly after former UW defensive coordinator Steve Belichick resigned to join his father's new staff at North Carolina.

The UW, however, has since replaced Sunseri with former NFL and USC All-America safety Taylor Mays, the Seattle native.

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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