Athlon Sports grades coaching hire of Jake Dickert at Wake Forest

The Wake Forest Demon Deacons looked across the country for their next head coach, poaching Jake Dickert from Washington State. Now, he’s looking to prove that he was the right man for the job and get Wake Forest competitive in the ACC.

Ahead of the season, Athlon Sports broke down coaching hires from around the country. They’d give Dickert a “B+” as there is promise for the future of the program.

“Dickert knows how to minimalize talent,” Athlon wrote. “His eight wins in ’24 were the best mark of his tenure at Washington State. He has no experience coaching in the East Coast or in the ACC, so he will need to adapt.”

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Wake Forest hasn’t won the ACC since 2006. Still, under previous head coach Dave Clawson, the program found some consistent success. He’d lead them to a 67-69 record from 2014 through 2024. That was when he made the decision to step down as the head coach at Wake Forest.

Jake Dickert now finds himself in a part of the country where he hasn’t coached before. A Wisconsin native, he’s never coached further East than the state of Missouri. The majority of his time as a coach has come in North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Washington.

In 2020, Dickert first joined Washington State as the team’s defensive coordinator. After previous head coach Nick Rolovich was fired due to not following the state’s vaccine mandates, Dickert was promoted to head coach in 2021, first as the interim coach and later as the full-time head coach.

At Washington State, Dickert put together a 23-20 record over about three and a half seasons, which included the difficult circumstances in which he took the program over. He’d lead the program to three different bowls but didn’t coach the bowl in 2024 after taking the Wake Forest job.

Anonymous ACC coach believes Wake Forest has a ‘wide-open audition at every position’

Jake Dickert has flipped the roster at Wake Forest. Still, there aren’t really any positions that seem solidified in who the starter is going to be. In fact, one coach in the ACC, who chose to stay anonymous, explained that they believe every position is wide open.

“They have a couple good players,” an ACC coach said. “But from what we know, it’s a totally wide-open audition at every position.”

Wake Forest is looking at a rebuild under Jake Dickert. That starts with a home game on August 29th against Kennesaw State.