{"id":599141,"date":"2026-02-18T17:41:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-18T17:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/599141\/"},"modified":"2026-02-18T17:41:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T17:41:10","slug":"oklahoma-expected-to-hire-deland-mccullough-as-running-backs-coach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/599141\/","title":{"rendered":"Oklahoma expected to hire Deland McCullough as running backs coach"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Oklahoma Sooners<\/a><\/b> have their next running backs coach, Sooners Illustrated<\/strong><\/a> on the 247Sports Network<\/strong><\/a> has learned.\u00a0Deland McCullough<\/a><\/b> is expected to takeover to backs room in Norman,\u00a0sources tell\u00a0Collin Kennedy<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Matt Zenitz<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0for\u00a0247Sports<\/strong><\/a>\/CBS Sports<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

McCullough comes to OU after longtime assistant coach DeMarco Murray<\/a><\/b> left for an opportunity<\/strong><\/a> with the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a><\/b>. McCullough returns to the collegiate level from the NFL.<\/p>\n

McCullough spent the 2025 season with the Las Vegas Raiders<\/a><\/b>. In his lone year with the franchise, McCullough helped mentor first-round pick Ashton Jeanty<\/a><\/b> amidst his transition to the pros.<\/p>\n

The Raiders struggled mightily in 2025, posting a 3-14 record then firing head coach Pete Carroll<\/a><\/b>. Las Vegas chose to hire Klint Kubiak<\/a><\/b>, and while filling out the new staff, McCullough was not retained.<\/p>\n

Upon hitting the free agent market, McCullough quickly became a target for Oklahoma. The Sooners are now set to bring in a veteran coach and a highly-respected presence in the industry.<\/p>\n

McCullough played at Miami<\/b> (Ohio<\/b>)<\/a> before spending time with the Cincinnati Bengals<\/a><\/b> and Philadelphia Eagles<\/a><\/b> in the NFL. McCullough then had stops with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers in the Canadian Football League and Chicago Enforcers of the XFL before retiring.<\/p>\n

McCullough got his collegiate coaching career started at his alma mater, Miami (Ohio), as a coaching intern contributing to special teams and the running backs room. McCullough was then hired at Indiana<\/a><\/b> in 2011 to be the running backs coach for current OU offensive analyst Kevin Wilson<\/a><\/b>.<\/p>\n

McCullough and Wilson spent several years together coaching the Hoosiers before changes struck in 2016. McCullough landed at USC<\/a><\/b> to be the Trojans’ running backs coach and run game coordinator in 2017.<\/p>\n

***OKLAHOMA FANS: CLICK HERE TO SUBSCRIBE TO SOONERS ILLUSTRATED AND GET 50% OFF YOUR FIRST YEAR OF VIP ACCESS!!!***<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

From 2018 to 2020, McCullough served as the running backs coach for the Kansas City Chiefs<\/a><\/b>. He was on staff when the Chiefs won Super Bowl LIV, played in back-to-back Super Bowls and appeared in three-consecutive AFC Championship Games.<\/p>\n

McCullough returned to\u00a0Indiana<\/a><\/b> for one season in 2021 before joining the staff at Notre Dame<\/a><\/b> in 2022. He served as the Fighting Irish’s running backs coach and received a promotion to run game coordinator after one year.<\/p>\n

While at Notre Dame, McCullough helped the Irish reach the 2024 National Championship. He played a primary role in\u00a0Audric Estim\u00e9 posting one of the best rushing seasons in program history in 2023. McCullough recruited Jeremiyah Love<\/a><\/b> to Notre Dame and coached the elite offensive playmaker into one of the nation’s best.<\/p>\n

While much of this was going on, McCullough had ties to Norman. His sons, Dasan McCullough<\/a><\/b> and Daeh McCullough<\/a><\/b>, both played at Oklahoma under Brent Venables<\/a><\/b>.<\/p>\n

Both McCullough brothers transferred out, but relationships had been built. The hiring of the aforementioned Wilson only added another familiar face for McCullough at Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

McCullough is yet another splash hire for the Sooners this offseason. He joins a staff in Norman hoping to build off momentum generated from a 2025 College Football Playoff run.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Oklahoma Sooners have their next running backs coach, Sooners Illustrated on the 247Sports Network has learned.\u00a0Deland McCullough…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":599142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[1318,1317,1315,1316,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-599141","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-ncaafootball","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116092868066860300","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=599141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/599141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/599142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=599141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=599141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=599141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}