Hawaii head coach Todd Graham went to a higher level for his first offensive hire.
Sam Bennett, who was a coaching assistant with the Arizona Cardinals the past NFL season, is joining Graham’s UH coaching staff.
Bennett is labeled as an “offensive assistant,” although he lists “offensive line” on his Twitter account.
Graham was hired on Jan. 13 as the successor to Nick Rolovich, who resigned to become Washington State’s head coach. Graham’s first moves were to retain Jacob Yoro and Abraham Elimimian as defensive coaches, and to hire Azusa Pacific head coach Victor Santa Cruz as defensive coordinator. Those three are UH alumni.
On Tuesday, Graham finalized the first step in constructing the offense. Last season’s four UH assistant coaches on offense all accepted positions at WSU. Bennett is experienced working with Graham and prolific passing attacks.
“Coach Bennett is one of the brightest coaches and best teachers I have encountered in my 30-plus years of coaching,” Graham said in a news release. “We are so thrilled to welcome him and we can’t wait for him to get started.”
Bennett said: “I have had a great admiration for the University of Hawaii football program since I attended a game here in 2001 while my father was coaching at SMU. The atmosphere and love for the game and university has stayed with me all these years. I look forward to working with a great group of young men and continue to build on the success they have achieved.”
Bennett was a graduate assistant for two years at Rice when the Owls moved from a triple option to a more wide open passing attack.
In 2016 and 2017, Bennett served as a graduate assistant at Arizona State, where Graham had established a quick-strike, no-huddle offense.
In 2018, Bennett was promoted to ASU’s offensive analyst.
Last year, Bennett joined Kliff Kingsbury’s staff with the Cardinals, where he was involved with daily practice and game planning for all phases of the offense.
Kingsbury is a practitioner of the Air Raid, a vertical-passing attack that accumulates yards and points at a quick pace. At Texas Tech, Kingsbury helped develop Patrick Mahomes, now the Kansas City Chiefs’ starting quarterback. This past season, Kingsbury was instrumental in Kyler Murray — the 2019 overall No. 1 pick — completing 64.4% of his passes for 3,722 yards.
The run and shoot, UH’s base offense the past two seasons, has many of the same elements as the Air Raid.
Bennett’s father, Phil Bennett, has been an FBS coach for 40 years, including the top job at SMU. The elder Bennett was Graham’s defensive coordinator at ASU in 2017.
Sam Bennett
>> Hometown: Dallas
>> Alma Mater: BA, Texas Tech (2010); MS, Arizona State (2017)
Coaching Experience
>> 2014-15: Rice, Graduate Assistant
>> 2016-17: Arizona State, Graduate Assistant
>> 2018: Arizona State, Offensive Analyst
>> 2019: Arizona Cardinals, Coaching Assistant
