Northwestern expected to hire Chip Kelly as next offensive coordinator

Longtime coach Chip Kelly is back in college. According to a report by On3’s Pete Nakos, Northwestern is expected to hire Kelly as its next offensive coordinator.

Nakos further reported that Kelly had interest from multiple schools to be an offensive coordinator. Among those jobs were Georgia Tech and North Carolina.

Kelly was an offensive coordinator in the Big Ten in 2024 with Ohio State. That year, the Buckeyes would go on to win the national championship. For Kelly, it was good enough to parlay that one season into an NFL offensive coordinator role with the Las Vegas Raiders. However, in November, he would be fired by the Raiders amid a 2-9 start to the season.

Despite that, Chip Kelly is still best known for his time as a head coach. After finding success at New Hampshire and Oregon as an offensive coordinator, he became the Oregon head coach in 2009. In four seasons there, Kelly had a 46-7 record. That included three conference championships, a Rose Bowl win, and a BCS National Championship Game appearance.

Kelly would then have two stops in the NFL as a head coach. In 2013, he made the jump to the Philadelphia Eagles, where he spent three seasons. Later, he had one season with the San Francisco 49ers. In the NFL, he had a 38-35 record and went to the playoffs once.

In 2018, Kelly would go on to take the UCLA job, which he held for six seasons. There, he would go to three bowl games and have one Top 25 finish. That was on the way to an overall record of 35-34 before he left for Ohio State. In total, that made his record as a college head coach 81-41. That was in stints at Pac-12 schools that have since made the move into the Big Ten.

Northwestern is coming off a season where the Wildcats went 7-6 and won the GameAbove Sports Bowl. Zach Lujan had been the offensive coordinator for the past two seasons. However, he would be among the changes made by head coach David Braun on his staff. This comes in a season where Northwestern finished 98th in total offense, averaging 346.1 yards per game. The Wildcats were also 98th in scoring offense, putting up 23.4 points per game.

Now, Chip Kelly is looking to spark that Northwestern offense in 2026. If successful, then the Wildcats could potentially take another step forward and become more competitive in the Big Ten next season.