‘He’s really about the details’

Logan Wilson, Al Golden’s first draft pick as Bengals coach, thought he might catch a glimpse of the future when he and fellow Bengals linebacker Joe Bachie attended Monday night’s national championship game .

After all, Wilson had heard the rumors. He just assumed Golden would be head coach Zac Taylor’s first choice to replace Lou Anarumo, the only defensive coordinator Wilson Seven’s has known.

When it was no longer a rumor, Wilson offered a scouting report on how Golden’s Notre Dame defense was nationally acclaimed at Ohio State before the Buckeyes held on to win.

“I saw some similar stuff from when he was in Cincinnati for a few years and he got some new stuff,” Wilson says. “It seemed like a lot of blitzing, and they ran a lot of coverage. I’ll be curious to see what we end up doing.”

Wilson is in a long line as the Bengals set about improving a defense that saw his team lose four games despite scoring 33 points. He’s heading into his sixth season coming off a knee injury that has knocked him out of the last six games believing Golden “will be good for us.”

Mike Mickens, Notre Dame’s defensive coach and passing game coordinator, guarantees it.

“He’s going to do great. Great spirit. He’ll be successful in whatever he does,” says Mickens, the former University of Cincinnati Bearcat. “He taught me to look at the game from different angles.”

Golden, calling Wilson “one of my most favorite players of all time,” can’t wait to start talking into Wilson’s helmet in the middle of his defense. And it’s mutual.

“He’s really about the details. He expects a lot from you and how he goes about his business and how he operates. You kind of want to replicate that in your own way,” Wilson says. “He made things simpler when he was with us, and so I feel like that’s why we were able to play quickly and I’m sure he’ll do similar things that we used It will have its little nuances in the system.

When the Bengals offered the home kitchen as a replacement for Anarumo, Golden couldn’t resist. “I’m the cheapest relocation in history,” he says. Not only did his family never move after leaving the Bengals to coach at Notre Dame so his kids could stay in school, but his fingerprints still live in the nooks and crannies of the defense three years after the Super Bowl LVI.

Start with Wilson’s linebacker room. Next, go to the safeties room, home of coach Jordan Kovacs who worked under Golden helping the linebackers the two years he was here. There’s also the Cubbyhole of defensive assistant Ronnie Regula, who coached for him at Notre Dame after playing for him when Golden was the head coach at the University of Miami.

“I loved playing for him. These guys will love playing for him. They know he’s going to put them in the best possible situation to succeed,” Regula said. “He’s earned a lot of respect for speaking in the room, commanding the room, because he knows they want them.”

The XS and OS can pretty much be sent as far as what Golden is going to do. A guy who coached against Matthew Stafford and Joe Burrow in training camps is going to do it all.

Its key words are flexible, adaptable, malleable. This means he will play all coverages and the scheme suits his players that day against that particular opponent.

“Whatever it takes to win the game,” Golden says.

What took Notre Dame to the national championship game was relentless man-to-man defense, and for the second year in a row, the Irish led the nation in opposing passer efficiency, and 13 interceptions. by Xavier Watts also set the pace for the country.

But is this what it’s going to take to compete in the AFC North? Taylor parlayed that knowledge of the division into a superior qualification for this hire.

“It all starts with the best acronym, right?” Said Golden. “Number one is ball disruption. Put a premium on that. Our number one job is to support our quarterback and people are like, what does that mean? We have to get the ball. This is our number one job. Give him opportunities.

“More than that, the overall theme of our defense is empowerment. So at the end of the day, whether it’s Logan, the safeties, whoever it is, they have to make decisions on the grass, and we have to make them responsible.”

So the X and the operating system are going to be the XS and the OS. He will play the man. He will play cover two. He’s going to blitz.

“We’ll do what our players do best,” Golden says. “Every game is different like a bingo board. If you approach everything, they bring you. Not really our MO”

What may end up being more intriguing is how Golden makes it work with a unique resume that has seen play on both sides.

He’s old enough to be the junior tight end who helped Penn State knock off No. 1 Notre Dame with a late touchdown catch on what was a rare nationally televised game. As a head coach himself at Temple and the University of Miami, he was one of the last to wear a tie and pants on game day.

He cut his defensive teeth on the followers of Howard Schnellenberger. But at 55, he’s also young enough to have worked on the offensive side of the ball with former Bengals offensive coordinator Brian Callahan in Detroit, where passing game guru Jim Caldwell was the head coach.