Robert Morris Football Hires Four New Coaches

Everyone is still trying to get over the March Madness run from Robert Morris, right? While that may be the case for most, the football program and head coach Bernard Clark Jr. were hard at work trying to fill holes along their coaching staff.

After the Colonials’ season wrapped up in late November, many of the Colonials’ coaches left the program for other jobs including offensive coordinator Josh Firm and defensive coordinator Dave Plungas. Firm is now the running backs coach at Montana State while Plungas is the linebackers coach at James Madison.

Over the last week, Clark has been filling some of the vacant spots on his staff and the most notable hire to this point of the offseason is Troy Rothenbuhler, the new offensive coordinator.

Rothenbuhler landed at Robert Morris after he spent the last five seasons as Youngstown State’s offensive coordinator. Previously in his coaching career, Rothenbuhler served as the offensive coordinator at Bowling Green, Findlay, Heidelberg, and Ohio Northern. He also has experience as a coach in the NFL as he served as a quality control coach for the Arizona Cardinals in 2018.

The next hire was Nick Dalton as the team’s new running backs coach. Dalton previously served as the quarterbacks coach and pass game coordinator for Lake Erie College prior to making the jump up to Division-I FCS football.

While he serviced the quarterbacks at his last stop, Dalton has experience in coaching a running backs room as he served that role at Lake Erie before he started coaching their quarterbacks.

Alongside Dalton, Robert Morris hired Tank Smith, the former Penn State and Saint Francis running back, as an assistant running backs coach. The upcoming season will mark the second season of coaching for Smith who graduated from Penn State in 2023. Last year, Smith was an assistant coach at Westminster College.

The lone hire on the defensive side of the ball so far was Derrick Nsubuga as a defensive line coach. Nsubuga is in his first year of coaching after spending the last two seasons as a defensive graduate assistant at Utah State.

While Clark and the Colonials still have not hired a defensive coordinator, they are slowly filling in the pieces along the staff.

Robert Morris opens its season on the road against West Virginia on Aug. 30 before Rothenbuhler gets a chance at his former team on Sept. 6.