Sonny Dykes recalls when he knew Lincoln Riley would be a good coach

The TCU Horned Frogs and USC Trojans are set to play in the Alamo Bowl. It’s a battle of two teams that have head coaches, Sonny Dykes and Lincoln Riley, who are also very familiar with one another and have even worked together in the past.

Both Dykes and Riley have found success at multiple stops as head coaches. So, the more experienced Dykes would open up at their joint Alamo Bowl press conference, sharing just how he knew that Riley would be a good head coach early in their time together.

“I think you kind of saw it early on,” Sonny Dykes said. “I think of Lincoln’s strengths is he’s a really good communicator. Coaching is teaching. That’s what we do, is we teach young people. We teach them how to play football and a lot of other stuff. Yeah, he was always good at communicating. He had a really clear sense of how to talk to players and how to be able to make a point with somebody. He was a really bright, hard-working guy.”

It would be at Texas Tech where Sonny Dykes and Lincoln Riley crossed paths. Initially a player under Mike Leach, Riley would join the coaching staff there in 2003. For his part, Dykes had worked with Leach at Kentucky before later following him to Texas Tech.

“The cool thing about Mike Leach is Mike empowered young coaches. I had kind of gone through the same thing. I was Mike’s GA in 1997 at Kentucky,” Dykes said. “Then went with Mike to Texas Tech in 2000 and got hooked up with Lincoln shortly thereafter. Mike did that for me when I was a GA. He gave me a ton of responsibility. I think that’s why so many guys that worked on that staff have gone on to be successful. It’s because he probably gave us more responsibility than we deserved. He believed in us, he empowered us, and he gave us confidence. He did the same thing for Lincoln.”

In 2010, Riley would get his first opportunity to be an offensive coordinator at ECU. By that time, Dykes was the Louisiana Tech head coach. Still, they held onto that relationship and Dykes even became a respected figure who other coaches, like Bob Stoops of Oklahoma, would go to and get perspective on the up-and-coming Riley.

“I always expected him to be really successful. Then I saw the Alamo Bowl when he called the game,” Dykes said. “I believe that was 2009. I remember watching the game going, ‘Okay, this guy is getting ready to take off.’ Went to East Carolina, was successful then. I’ll never forget, I was coaching at Cal, and Bob Stoops called me and asked me about Lincoln. He said, ‘What do you think about this guy?’ I said, ‘It’s a home run, you need to hire him if you get a chance to do it.’ Obviously, did a tremendous job as a coordinator there and as a head coach. Launched just a fantastic career.”

Today, Lincoln Riley has a record of 90-27 as a head coach. That includes a 35-17 record at USC. He hasn’t quite made a national championship, like Dykes has at TCU, but plenty of experts expect it’s a matter of time for Riley.