Tony Alford, the new running backs coach at Michigan football, talks about why he left Ohio State to pursue a comparable position at Ann Arbor in the video above.
However, Alford returns to Ann Arbor with his formidable recruiting skills and seasoned coaching expertise after spending almost ten years in Columbus.
In a game in the Horseshoe in November, he will head a deep running back unit that includes Donovan Edwards, Ben Hall, Kalel Mullings, and others as U-M defends its national championship and looks to keep winning against the Buckeyes.
Born in November 1968 in Akron, Ohio, Tony Alford is an Ohioan. In high school, he was a running back, and from 1987 to 1990, Colorado State was home to him.
When Alford ran for 1,035 yards and established a conference record with 310 yards versus Utah in 1989, he was nominated for the Doak Walker Award as a junior. He was named to the Western Athletic Conference’s First Team and received honorable mention status on the All-America team that year.
Urban Meyer became an assistant coach at Colorado State in 1990. Over twenty years later, Alford’s Fort Collins ties would come in handy.
Alford played in the NFL for a short while after graduating from college, making the Denver Broncos preseason roster, and then played in the World League of American Football. Alford started his coaching career in 1993 and became a college coach at Mount Union in 1995.
Alford has almost 25 years of experience coaching running backs at some of the top collegiate football teams, such as Ohio State and Notre Dame, two of the biggest schools in the Midwest. Charlie Weiss hired him in 2009 at Notre Dame, and Brian Kelly kept him on staff the following year.
Alford served as the wide receivers coach in South Bend from 2010 to 2011, the running backs coach, slot receivers coach, and receiving coordinator from 2012 to 2013, and the running backs coach and recruiting coordinator from 2014 to present.
Alford was hired by Ohio State from Notre Dame in 2015. Alford gave several reasons for the transfer at the time, including his acquaintance with Urban Meyer and the support of Ed Warinner, Tim Hinton, and Chris Ash.
Since 2015, Alford has served as the running backs coach and offensive assistant head coach at Columbus. He was kept on after Ryan Day replaced Urban Meyer as head coach, and in January 2022 he was promoted to run game coordinator. Using his profile at Ohio State:
Alford’s running backs, who include 1,000-yard rushers TreVeyon Henderson (2021), Mike Weber (2016), J.K. Dobbins (2017, 2018 and 2019), and Ezekiel Elliott (2015), have been nothing short of extraordinarily productive, durable, and dependable. Under Alford, Ohio State had only one 1,000-yard rusher, Trey Sermon, who carried for 636 yards in three games leading up to the CFP National Championship Game, in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.
All of Alford’s starting running backs in Columbus have been drafted: Elliott (chosen by Dallas with the fourth pick overall in 2016), Weber (picked by Dallas with the second pick overall in 2019), Dobbins (drafted with the 55th pick overall in 2020), and Sermon (drafted with the 88th pick overall in 2021).
While attending Ohio State, Alford investigated his options and was approached by other programs. Though he reportedly declined a reunion with Brian Kelly at LSU, he has stated his ambition to become a head coach has twice thrown his hat in the ring for the Colorado State head coaching position.
He is now bringing Ann Arbor his expertise.
