TCU Head Football Coach Gary Patterson on Wednesday, Feb. 5 announced coaching and staff updates for the school’s football program.
Jerry Kill has joined the Horned Frogs as special assistant to the head coach in charge of the offense. Bryan Applewhite is the new running backs coach, while Doug Meacham rejoins the TCU program as inside receivers/tight ends coach. Additionally, Jarrett Anderson will move from inside receivers/tight ends coach to the offensive line, a position he coached for the Horned Frogs from 2014-16.
Kill served as special assistant to the head coach at Virginia Tech this past season. Among his many coaching accolades, Kill was the consensus 2014 Big Ten Coach of the Year after leading Minnesota to the Citrus Bowl for its first New Year’s Day game since 1962. He was head coach of the Golden Gophers from 2011-15.
While at Southern Illinois (2001-07), he was the FCS Eddie Robison National Coach of the Year in 2004 as well as the 2007 Liberty Mutual Coach of the Year. He led the Salukis to five straight NCAA playoff appearances. He then served as head coach at Northern Illinois from 2008-10, earning the Grant Teaff FCA Coach of the Year Award in 2010 when he guided the Huskies to a 10-3 record and berth in the Mid-American Conference Championship Game.
Following his time at Minnesota, Kill briefly stepped away from coaching in 2016. He served as associate athletics director for administration at Kansas State, before returning to the sidelines as the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Rutgers in 2017. He was director of athletics at Southern Illinois in 2018.
Applewhite served the last five seasons as running backs coach at Colorado State. In February 2018, he was promoted to the additional duties of recruiting coordinator. Two of the Rams’ top-five season marks in total offense and points per game came during his time in Fort Collins.
A 21-year veteran of the coaching ranks, Applewhite served five years at ULM (2010-14) before his arrival at CSU. He also spent one season at Montana State (2009) and six at Wyoming (2003-08) as running backs coach. Prior to joining the Wyoming staff, he coached at his alma mater, Northern Colorado, from 1999-2002.
Meacham was most recently offensive coordinator of the XFL’s St. Louis BattleHawks. After leaving TCU following the 2016 season, he served as offensive coordinator at Kansas.
In each of his first two seasons at TCU (2014-15), the Horned Frogs’ offensive attack ranked among the nation’s best.
In 2015, for the second straight year, TCU set single-season school records in several major statistical categories. Additionally, the Horned Frogs ranked third nationally in total offense (562.8 yards per game) and seventh in scoring (42.1 points per game).
In his first season at TCU, Meacham helped the Horned Frogs become the nation’s most improved offense in total yards (+188.2 ypg) and scoring (+21.4 ppg). TCU’s 21.4 points per game improvement broke the Big 12 record of 19.1 set by Oklahoma in 1999 (35.8; 16.7, 1998) and was the largest improvement by any team since Northwestern went up 24.0 points between 1999-00.
The 2014 Horned Frogs ranked second in the nation in scoring (46.5 ppg) and tied for fifth in total offense (533.0 ypg). TCU set 26 school records for offense in winning its first Big 12 championship as well as the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl.
Meacham was a 2014 finalist for the Broyles Award, recognizing the nation’s top assistant coach.
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