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JANUARY 28, 2010 ISSUE

Defensive Coach Wiley Is Second Coach to Leave ASU Football Staff

Story by Jason Gilmer

Former ASU All-American Marques Murrell became the sixth Mountaineer to play in a NFL conference championship game, as he recorded two tackles for the New York Jets in their loss to the Indianapolis Colts last weekend.

John Wiley

Strickland Named ASU Soccer Head Coach

The women’s soccer team has a new head coach—Sarah Strickland, a 12-year coaching veteran at the club, collegiate and national levels.

Her last stop was a stint as an assistant coach at Mississippi State University.

“I am excited to welcome Coach Strickland to the Appalachian family,” athletic director Charlie Cobb said in a press release. “Her energy and enthusiasm is contagious and will take ASU women’s soccer to unprecedented heights.”

Strickland becomes the third head coach in the 16-year history of ASU’s women’s soccer program. She replaces Hallie Briggs, who led the Mountaineers to a 6-9-4 record as acting head coach in 2009.

ASU Football Head Coach Jerry Moore isn’t just looking for new football players during this time of the year. He’s also looking for a new defensive coordinator.

John Wiley, who took over as ASU defensive coordinator in 1998, recently joined former ASU Assistant Coach Ruffin McNeil on the East Carolina University (ECU) staff. McNeil spent time at ASU in the mid-1990s.

Wiley was named the associate head coach and linebackers coach for the ECU Pirates.

While at ASU, he oversaw a defensive unit that was twice the top-ranked defense in the Southern Conference and produced three Southern Conference defensive players of the year.

Wiley is the second assistant coach to move on from the Mountaineers staff to other jobs, as offensive line coach Shawn Elliott is now in the same position at The University of South Carolina.

“The fact that John and Shawn have moved on to such prestigious positions is a compliment to the success that we’ve had as a program,” Moore said in a press release. “People recognize that we’ve got good coaches here and that is a great testament to what we’ve built. We’ll work to find coaches that can fill their shoes and build on the foundation that coaches like John and Shawn have been so instrumental in helping us construct.”

Mountaineer in AFC Conference Championship Game
Former ASU All-American Marques Murrell became the sixth Mountaineer to play in a NFL conference championship game, as he recorded two tackles for the New York Jets in their loss to the Indianapolis Colts last weekend.

Murrell played in 11 games for the Jets this season and recorded 14 combined tackles.

ASU 2010 Football Schedule Change
There has been a change made to the Mountaineers football schedule for the upcoming season.

They will play at Samford’s Seibert Stadium in Birmingham, Ala., on September 25 instead of October 2.

ASU was supposed to have a bye on September 25, but that will now be on October 2, the week before the Elon game.