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UW's Shephard Receives Coaching Award for Receivers' Play

The Husky assistant coach supervised the only pair of 75-catch, 1,000-yard pass-catchers on an FBS team.
Dan Raley|
UW's Shephard Receives Coaching Award for Receivers' Play
UW's Shephard Receives Coaching Award for Receivers' Play

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Washington Huskies

JaMarcus Shephard apparently was a very good hire as the receivers coach for the University of Washington football team, and not because he makes everyone smile or laugh at his continual antics.

He also shares in high-level results, with FootballScoop on Tuesday naming him as college football's Receivers Coach of the Year for the ample production of his players.

In choosing Shephard, the media organization noted how this first-year UW assistant coach oversaw the only pair of 75-catch, 1,000-yard wide receivers who played for the same FBS team.

Shephard had a hand in evolving the play of Jalen McMillan, who finished with 79 catches for 1,098 yards and 9 touchdowns, and Rome Odunze, who caught 75 balls for 1,145 yards and 7 scores.

Add to that the third UW starting wide receiver in Ja'Lynn Polk, who hauled in 41 passes for 694 yards and 6 touchdowns; Giles Jackson, who came up with 28 receptions for 328 yards and a score; and Taj Davis, who had 21 catches for 277 yards and 3 TDs.

Shephard, a personable, demanding coach who could be a professional motivational speaker if he so desired, became an award finalist alongside Ohio State's Brian Hartline, TCU's Malcolm Kelly/Doug Meacham, Tennessee's Kelsey Pope, UTSA's Joe Price and Iowa State's Nate Scheelhaase, and was selected by a vote of prior winners. 

Previous winners of this award are Bobby Kennedy (Texas, 2008), Zach Azzanni (Central Michigan, 2009), Brent Pease (Boise State, 2010), Ted Gilmore (USC, 2011), Matt Lubick (Duke, 2012), Lawrence Dawsey (Florida State, 2013), Rusty Burns/Doug Meacham (TCU, 2014), Tate Wallis (Baylor, 2015), Todd Fitch/Joe Sloan (Louisiana Tech, 2016), Kasey Dunn (Oklahoma State, 2017), Tyron Carrier (West Virginia, 2018), Jeff Scott (Clemson, 2019), Holmon Wiggins (Alabama, 2020), and Brian Hartline (Ohio State, 2021). 

Pease and Lubick are former UW wide-receiver coaches.

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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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