Few assistant coaching positions in college football are as demanding as coaching cornerbacks at the University of Florida. When Gator fans fill the Swamp in the fall, they don’t merely expect to see good cornerback play; they expect to see the next Joe Haden, Vernon Hargreaves or CJ Henderson on the field.
In a normal year, that makes this position stressful enough. Add in the nosedive that UF’s cornerbacks took last season and the make-or-break status this season has for the defensive staff, and first-year cornerbacks coach Jules Montinar is walking into a pressure cooker.
Montinar is excited and grateful for the opportunity. After working at Alabama as a graduate assistant under Nick Saban and at Georgia as a quality control coach for Kirby Smart, Dan Mullen finally presented him with that first big opportunity he’d been looking for.
As an ace recruiter, Montinar is tasked with restoring the cornerback room to its elite past and keeping it there through his efforts on the recruiting trail. He was so excited that he literally hit the ground running since Mullen hired him in January.
“I got offered the job on Thursday night,” Montinar said. “Friday morning, I told my head coach [at South Florida], Jeff Scott, that I was accepting the job. [Assistant director of football operations] Jon Clark called me around noon to say, ‘Hey, Coach Mullen wanted me to check with you. We’ve got a 10 a.m. team meeting up here in Gainesville. Why don’t you come up and introduce yourself to the team?’ So, in my mind, ‘Yeah, I’ve got nothing to do. Let me come up and introduce myself.’ I got here about 9:30, met Jon Clark, met Coach Mullen. They took me around the facilities, showed me the locker room, showed me my office.
“When I was in the locker room, [Mullen] said, ‘Hey, here’s your locker. There’s gear in it.’ I was like, ‘Oh, should I put the gear on?’ They’re like, ‘Yeah, go ahead and put it on.’ I put the gear on, walked outside and that was about 9:55. Next thing you know, the team’s out there in the Swamp. Coach Mullen reaches out to me to introduce myself in front of the team. Ten minutes later, I was in the middle of a workout with the cornerbacks.”
From the outside looking in, it looked like Mullen was taking a huge gamble by hiring a guy who’d never held an on-field, full-time coaching position at a Power Five school before. However, after reviewing his resume and talking to some people who’d worked with him, Mullen felt that Montinar was the obvious choice.
“Jules was a guy that was a recruiter of the year, has a great pedigree, he’s learned, he’s worked his way up within the coaching profession,” Mullen said. “Had to kind of start battling, be at different levels and learn how to coach at different levels, learn under some great secondary coaches as well early in his career and then had success both in recruiting and with his players on the field.
“Everyone I’m talking to [told me] what a great team guy he is, what a great high-energy guy he is, what a great young up-and-coming coach he is. A guy being from Florida and the opportunity to come coach at Florida, just all of that made him the guy that in the end was really a no-brainer for me.”
Now Montinar looks to prove Mullen right.
To prepare himself for spring practice, Montinar underwent a painful task – he watched every game from the 2020 season to gauge what he had to work with. What he saw is a group with one outstanding player and a bunch of young, unproven ones.
Kaiir Elam is one of the best cornerbacks in the country and a likely first round pick in the 2022 NFL Draft. He’s long, fast and physical and plays with a consistently high level of confidence. Even with teams throwing away from him last season, he still managed to snag two interceptions. Montinar has been impressed with how coachable Elam is despite all the accolades and how he’s trying to set a good example for the other players.
“I love his attitude,” Montinar said. “He comes to work every day. Since day one, his attitude’s been awesome in the room, has great leadership qualities. He comes in, he writes notes, he asks questions. One of the first things we did right when I got here was start watching the point-of-attack tape, all of the plays that he was involved in from this past season. We just started watching them and finding ways we could improve and finding a way to improve the really good plays and try to make them great.
“He was asking for more. ‘Coach, when can we meet? I’m available this time.’ It’s been great. I can’t say enough great things about this kid because he leads by example. We’ll be in a meeting room and some of our younger guys that haven’t learned this defense, and they’re not taking notes. And this is Kaiir’s third or fourth time hearing this stuff, and he’s writing down everything us coaches are still saying. I think he’s a student of the game, and I’m really fired up about having him in the room.”
Elam’s junior classmate, Jaydon Hill, has appeared in 22 games the past two seasons with five starts. If the Gators had to play a game today, he would probably start opposite of Elam.
Once you get past Elam and Hill, there are a handful of guys who were highly ranked high school recruits but haven’t accomplished anything in college yet.
Redshirt freshman Jahari Rogers was a top-100 prospect, while classmate Avery Helm was a low four-star recruit. Rogers has gotten some first-team reps this spring and will contribute in the fall. Both of them call Texas home, so Montinar was already familiar with them from his three-year stint at Texas State. He also assisted with their recruitment when he was at Georgia.
“Jahari was a high school quarterback,” Montinar said. “He ran track, had really good speed. Avery was a really good player out of high school.”
Then there are the two early enrollees, one of which has been one of the most discussed players on the entire roster. Five-star recruit Jason Marshall has tremendous size, physicality, instincts and explosiveness. He’s already won some battles against UF’s top receivers in the spring. The expectation is that he will slide into the starting lineup at some point this season. Jordan Young likely won’t play much this season but is an intriguing prospect down the road.
“Those guys have done an unbelievable job learning the defense,” Montinar said. “Those guys should be in high school. Jason has done a great job this camp, has an unbelievable attitude, comes to work every day, very smart, very athletic. Jordan Young has done a great job for us, too. Very smart, very athletic, and he loves football.
“The biggest thing for those guys is this is the first time they’re going through a spring practice. This is the first time they’re actually getting meaningful reps and learning the defense, making plays and making mistakes and learning from those mistakes. So, it’s been good. We’re really fired up.”
Montinar is markedly different from Torrian Gray, the previous cornerbacks coach. He’s highly energetic and hands-on with his players. If you watched any of the practices live on Instagram, you know how loud he is and how much attention to detail he demands.
Wesley McGriff, who’s in his first year as UF’s safeties coach, said Montinar is an excellent communicator and has a bright future in this profession.
“He is very, very detailed,” McGriff said. “He’s a sharp guy. So, the thing I really like about him is he makes sure he gets all of his questions answered, all T’s crossed and all I’s dotted, before we leave the room. The guy is a really, really good communicator. He’s going to be doing this for a long time because it’s important to him.”
Montinar’s tried to learn as much about his players as possible so that he can tailor his coaching to each player’s personality. He doesn’t have a one-style-fits-all approach.
“Everybody comes from different backgrounds,” he said. “My job as a coach is to find out ‘How does this guy learn? Is he a guy that needs walk-through reps? Is he a guy that learns in the meeting room? Is he a guy that you’ve got to send him a text message?’ Whatever the case may be, you’ve got to get the job done. What I have found out in my experience is they learn by seeing it. They also learn by doing it. As a coach, you can say, ‘Hey, go cover the guy.’ Well, that sounds good. You’ve got to show him how to cover the guy. ‘Where’s your hand placement? Where’s your happy hands? Where’s your eyes? What are your keys?’ On-the-field teaching and hands-on teaching would be one of my styles.”
He also thinks it’s important to get guys as many reps as possible. His goal isn’t just to build a strong set of starting corners; his objective is to build a deep position that is set up well for the future as well.
“I learned this a long time ago: They’re not going to learn by standing next to me,” he said. “So, we’ve got to get them out there. We’ve got to get them reps. We’ve got to get them in the situations. That’s the only way they’re going to learn. Guys playing multiple positions, extra meetings, whatever the case may be.”
Montinar has a big challenge in front of him. All he’s expected to do is take one of the worst cornerback groups in program history and make it one of the best in the SEC in one offseason with only two experienced returnees. That might be too much to ask for some coaches, but defensive coordinator Todd Grantham is confident that Montinar’s the man for the job.
“He’s been around some guys that I have a lot of respect for on the defensive side of the ball, and based upon the interview and what he knows, that’s something that I want to bring to this staff from a knowledge standpoint with where he’s been and what he’s been able to do,” Grantham said. “As a young guy, again, he brings energy to that room, accountability and really like the way he works with his guys.”