Tuesday, January 1, 2013
LITTLE ROCK — FOOTBALL ASU adds 3 new coaches
New Arkansas State football Coach Bryan Harsin took three more steps closer to completing his initial coaching staff.
Harsin, who was introduced as Gus Malzahn’s replacement Dec. 12, announced Monday that Kent Riddle has been named ASU assistant head coach , tight ends coach and special teams coordinator.
Harsin later named Brad Bedell as the team’s offensive line coach and Bush Hamdan as an offensive assistant whose specific duties will be announced at a later day.
The three hires give ASU six of the nine assistant coaches allowed by the NCAA. Harsin has not yet named an offensive coordinator, a wide receivers coach, nor has he assigned defensive coaching assignments beyond John Thompson as the team’s defensive coordinator and Blake Baker as a defensive assistant.
Riddle comes to ASU after spending two seasons at North Texas. He coached with Harsin at Boise State from 2001-2005, and has also coached at Oregon State in 1993-94, Army in 1995-2000, Colorado in 2006-2010.
Bedell spent this past season as offensive line coach at New Mexico State and has also worked at California-Davis, Northern Colorado and as an intern at Colorado.
He was a second-team All-American by the Associated Press as a lineman at Colorado in 1999 before playing six seasons in the NFL with the Cleveland Browns, Miami Dolphins, Green Bay Packers and Houston Texans before retiring in 2006.
Hamdan, who was a quarterback at Boise State in 2005-2008 while Harsin was on the Broncos’ staff, spent the 2012 season as the wide receivers coach at Florida, the 2011 season at Sacramento State and the 2010 season as an intern at Maryland.
BASKETBALL Young honored by SEC
Arkansas sophomore guard BJ Young was named SEC Player of the Week on Monday after scoring 26 points with a career-high 13 rebounds and 7 assists in the Razorbacks’ 79-61 victory over Northwestern (La.) State last Saturday night. Young is the first Arkansas player to be SEC Player of the Week in two seasons, since former Razorback Rotnei Clarke won it twice in 2011.
Sports, Pages 18 on 01/01/2013