Black Voices: News, Culture & Community from Across the Nation
- Toriano Morgan leaves Edward Waters for Tennessee State, appointing Brian Jenkins as interim head coach.
- Jenkins returns to coaching with nearly 30 years of experience, including a successful tenure at Bethune-Cookman.
- The TSU coaching staff features notable members, including Dexter Jackson and Gregg Williams, enhancing team leadership.
Four-year head coach Toriano Morgan has left Edward Waters for Tennessee State and longtime black college mentor Brian Jenkins has been installed as the Tigers’ interim head coach.
Morgan, who compiled an 18-24 record in four years leading EWU and had previously agreed to a three-year contract extension with the school in December 2023, resigned last Wednesday (7/16) to join head coach Reggie Barlow at TSU.
Morgan, a TSU graduate, had led EWU during the football program’s transition from the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA) to NCAA Division II status.
He will be the co-offensive coordinator and running backs coach for Barlow at TSU. A South Florida native, Morgan had previously worked as offensive coordinator atVirginia State when Barlow led the Trojans from 2016 to 2021.
The other co-offensive coordinator is Shannon Harris, also a TSU alum and former quarterback for the Tigers, who replaced Barlow as head coach of the UFL’s DC Defenders this season and led that team to the league championship.
Also on Barlow’s star-studded TSU staff are Tampa Bay Buccaneers’Super Bowl XXXVII MVP Dexter Jackson as safeties coach and former NFL head coach and longtime defensive guru Gregg Williams as defensive coordinator.
Jenkins, who has worked alongside Morgan since 2021 and has nearly 30 years of coaching experience, is back in Florida as a head coach for the second time in his career.
Jenkins, 54, served as head coach at Bethune-Cookman from 2010-14, where he compiled a 46-14 record and won the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference’s coach of the year award in 2010, 2012 and 2013. His Wildcats teams won or tied for first in the MEAC four times and appeared three times in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) playoffs.
He subsequently moved to Alabama State in December 2014 where he coached until he was let go in October 2017 with a 9-17 record. Jenkins also has assistant coaching stints at Eastern Illinois (1995-99), Bowling Green (2000), the Frankfurt Galaxy of NFL Europe (2001), Louisiana-Lafayette (2002-08), Rutgers (2009), Alabama A&M (2018) and North Carolina Central (2019).
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