Scott Satterfield's UC football Bearcats have a new offensive coordinator

Cincinnati's first offensive coordinator as they enter the fray of Big 12 football will bring plenty of league experience as new Bearcats coach Scott Satterfield has hired Tom Manning from Iowa State.

Manning comes most recently from Iowa State where he recently parted ways with head coach Matt Campbell. The two were teammates at Mount Union and Manning was on his staff at Toledo that followed Campbell to Iowa State and the Big 12. He had been the offensive line coach/offensive coordinator since 2016 outside of spending 2018 in the NFL with the Colts as tight ends coach.

A three-time Broyles Award (nation's top assistant) semifinalist, he coached seven NFL Draft Picks for the Cyclones and helped lead ISU to four bowl games, including the team’s first-ever New Year’s Six berth – a victory in the 2020 Fiesta Bowl.

“I’m thrilled to welcome Tom and his family to Cincinnati,” Satterfield said. “Tom is a tremendous coach who I have known for more than a decade when he was a graduate assistant for us during my time at Toledo. He’s had success in the Big 12, developed several NFL draft picks and coached every offensive position during his career. He’s been an NFL tight ends coach, which is the same position he will coach here, and he knows the state of Ohio as well as anybody, which will be a huge advantage for us on the recruiting trail.”

Manning was paid $950,000 last season, according to the Des Moines Register's Randy Peterson, and was scheduled to be bumped to $1,000,000 July 1 in a contract expiring June 2024. It states, "should the employee begin new employment during the term at a lower salary, the University will pay the difference in salary for the remaining period of the term."

From 2019-2021 the Iowa State offense averaged over 31 points per game. The Cyclones slipped to 4-8 this past season after starting 3-0 which included a 10-7 win over Music City Bowl winner Iowa. They had a number of single-digit losses in the Big 12, falling to Baylor by seven, Kansas by three, Kansas State by one, Texas by three, Oklahoma State by six and Texas Tech by four.

Iowa State broke the school record for total offense (444.3) and had the third-best scoring offense (32.2) in school history in 2019 and followed it up with the second-best scoring offense (32.9) and third-best total offense (436.3) totals in Cyclone history in 2020.

In between his leadership of the Cyclones’ offense, Manning coached tight ends for the Indianapolis Colts in 2018, helping lead the Colts to the playoffs. He also served as the offensive line coach at Toledo from 2012 to 2015, earning FootballScoop.com National Offensive Line Coach of the Year honors in 2015 and helping lead the Rockets to three bowls.

Current NFL stars coached by Manning include wide receiver Allen Lazard, running backs David Montgomery (Mount Healthy High School) and Breece Hall, tight end Charlie Kolar and quarterback Brock Purdy.

Hall and Montgomery were both First Team All-Americans, while Kolar was a two-time Mackey Award finalist – among several accolades. Purdy set nearly every passing record at ISU and was a two-time First Team All-Big 12 selection.

Manning was a player and coach at Division III powerhouse Mount Union and was a grad assistant at Toledo in 2009 where he first crossed paths with Satterfield, then the passing game coordinator for the Rockets.

Manning was at Cincinnati's basketball game Sunday afternoon against Houston sitting with head coach Satterfield and other new staff members. All are expected to be formally introduced Tuesday.

New faces in player personnel

Other hires previously reported include general manager Zach Grant who comes to UC after a year at Ohio State and five as Director of Player Personnel at Western Kentucky. He was Football Scoop's Player Personnel Director of the Year in 2021 with the Hilltoppers. This past season he helped the Buckeyes assemble a top-seven class which included Malik Hartford of Lakota West.

At WKU, he helped engineer the school's top-ranked recruiting class of all time and recruited Atlanta Falcons third-round pick defensive end DeAngelo Malone and current New England Patriots quarterback Bailey Zappe out of the transfer portal. Zappe set the NCAA record for single-season passing yards and touchdowns. During his time at WKU, he had a hand in recruiting 47 all-conference selections. Grant graduated from Notre Dame in 2016, serving in several undergraduate roles with the football program.

Coming with Grant is Cass Simmons as Director of Recruiting Strategy. Simmons spent a season with the Buckeyes and was previously at Stephen F. Austin. Simmons was an offensive line assistant and later the director of player personnel at Stephen F. Austin for multiple seasons before joining the Buckeyes recruiting staff

Jack Griffith is the new Director of Player Personnel coming from the New York Jets scouting department. He also was recently with Grant at Ohio State. The former law student was previously with Villanova's football program. Griffith was a safety at Marist, earning CoSIDA Academic All-District honors.

Caroline Tart is Director of Recruiting. Tart spent the last two seasons at Louisville as the Director of On-Campus Recruiting, helping lead UofL’s recruiting efforts to secure one of the ACC’s top recruiting classes. At Louisville, Tart handled all on-campus recruiting activities, including official visits, unofficial visits, junior days, game day programming and other special events.

Prior to her stint at UofL, she was on the recruiting staff at Oklahoma (2017-21) and North Carolina (2017) as the recruiting operations coordinator and on-campus recruiting assistant, respectively. During her time at Oklahoma, she helped land four Top 10 recruiting classes.

“Recruiting is the lifeblood for any football team and I’m confident we have assembled one of the nation’s top recruiting staffs in the country,” Satterfield said. “In the changing landscape of college football, player evaluation and retention, and finding the best fits for your program will be more important than ever.

“We’ve grown our recruiting and personnel department to be the biggest it has ever been here at the University of Cincinnati. The track records of success for our new staff members speak for themselves. They’ve all been at winning programs, and we are excited to have them hit the ground running here at UC.”

Satterfield's chief of staff is Mark Speir who served in the same role at Louisville and Carter Wilson will work in recruiting. Wilson was also formerly at Louisville and previously at Florida.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Tom Manning, recently of Iowa State, is UC's new offensive coordinator