Spring Introduction: Getting to Know Ron Roberts

Ron Roberts brings more than 30 years of coaching experience to Billy Napier's staff. (Photo: Maddie Washburn/UAA Communications)

Spring Introduction: Getting to Know Ron Roberts

Tuesday, March 12, 2024 | Football, Scott Carter

By: Scott Carter, Senior Writer

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — They are just two words, but they have had a significant presence this offseason for Florida's football program — those words: goodbye, hello.

In the case of Ron Roberts, welcome back is perhaps more appropriate.

As head coach Billy Napier prepared for his third season with the Gators, he made numerous changes to his staff. Some swaps featured behind-the-scenes personnel, and others included more visible on-field staff.

Suppose the Gators reverse their fortunes under Napier in 2024. In that case, there is a strong likelihood that none of the moves will have an impact as significant as veteran assistant Roberts, whom Napier hired and assigned a mouthful of a title: executive assistant head coach, co-defensive coordinator/inside linebackers coach.

The 56-year-old Roberts arrives at UF following a season as defensive coordinator at Auburn, where he guided the Tigers to meaningful statistical improvements in nearly all the major defensive categories. The chief blemish during Roberts' tenure at Auburn was the fourth-and-31 touchdown pass that allowed Alabama to win the Iron Bowl and go on to win the Southeastern Conference Championship Game.

Roberts has spent most of his 30-year coaching career far from the scorching lights of the Southeastern Conference. He had never coached in the league until Hugh Freeze hired him as defensive coordinator at Auburn.

New #Gators assistant Ron Roberts was asked about a recent issue for defense: "We've got to be great in that category. That's what the game is about. You do all the stuff and you can draw it up, but if you can't tackle them and get them on the ground, it's kind of a problem." pic.twitter.com/5Zo0HZvhDd
— Scott Carter (@GatorsScott) March 9, 2024

He is here because UF's defense in Napier's two seasons has not been good enough.

"We need to play better on that side of the ball," Napier said. "We were able to get one of the better defensive coaches in the country back on our staff."

While Roberts might not be a household name in Dixie, the California native has been a successful head coach at Division II Delta State and Southern Louisiana, an FCS program. He joined Napier for the first time in 2018 at Louisiana as defensive coordinator, spending two seasons there before reuniting with Dave Aranda. Roberts hired a young Aranda as his co-defensive coordinator at Delta State in 2007. More than a decade later, after a successful stint as LSU's defensive coordinator, Aranda became Baylor's head coach in 2020, and he hired Roberts as his defensive coordinator.

Roberts is energized by the reunion with Napier and Gators defensive coordinator Austin Armstrong, a young Roberts protégé at Louisiana who became the youngest defensive coordinator in the country in 2021 at Southern Miss.

He aligns strongly with Napier's vision.

"It's comforting for him to know what you're getting into, and I believe a lot of the things he believes in about developing team, players, program, running things and all of that stuff," Roberts said. "You always want the systems to be firing away, but it's a lot easier when you're already 100% in, and let's go dive in. I'm ready to go. I'm glad we got the opportunity to get back together."

Napier said Roberts would "coach the coaches" on defense, with 30-year-old Armstrong as the defensive coordinator. Roberts is here for his experience and defensive knowledge, an elder voice on a mostly youthful staff.

Roberts considers Armstrong a rising star in the profession.

"I mean, he's brilliant," Roberts said. "He's very smart. He's going to have a future to do whatever he wants in this profession. He's going to be tremendous. I'm just happy to be here to have the opportunity to help in ways, and that's one thing you get with a chance to be older. You've seen some things."

As we dive deeper into the backgrounds of the newest members of the program during spring camp, here is a closer look at Roberts:

DEFENSIVE PHILOSOPHY

Roberts did not go into detail when asked what he prefers to do defensively, but he has been a proponent of odd fronts and multiple schemes in his career, reminiscent of some of the veteran coaches he mentioned he looked to as mentors in learning his craft: Dom Capers, Dick LeBeau, Wade Phillips and Greg Williams were names that came to Roberts' mind when he was asked Saturday during his first media availability at Florida.

LeBeau, a guru-type figure in coaching circles and creator of the zone blitz, sought to pressure the quarterback by constantly disguising looks to confuse the quarterback and bringing pressure from anywhere on the field. In researching Roberts' career, it became apparent that others in the business consider him a coach's coach. In a story titled "The Education of Dave Aranda" by Bruce Feldman of The Athletic in 2019, Aranda recalls how he became obsessed as a young coach in Southern California and wanted to study as much film as possible. Through his connections, he met Bill Williams, a former college coach considered the "godfather of the football clinic scene," according to Feldman.

Williams owned more than 8,000 videos from practices from every level, and Aranda would often visit and watch hours of videos in Williams' garage office. Roberts continuously spoke at clinics in those videos, which caught Aranda's attention. The two eventually made contact to talk defense.

By the time Roberts offered Aranda a job at Delta State, Aranda had risen to become defensive coordinator at Cal Lutheran. He told Feldman what it was like working under Roberts and how much he learned.

"Every meeting, guys would be on the board," Aranda said. "Right away, you know as a staff who could talk it and who needed work. I really liked that. You could learn from each other. It wasn't some gotcha deal. There was a lot of modeling for the younger guys to talk through stuff."

On Saturday, Roberts had this to say about learning what works: "I think a common mistaken approach is that you don't want to take everything you like or things you believe in from different people. I may not believe the whole thing, so I think that's what coaching is, is really, you're stealing from a lot of people. And then you kind of mold it together how it all fits and things."

CONNECTING WITH NAPIER

Roberts was at Southern Louisiana when he first crossed paths with Napier.

The two developed a mutual respect, and when Napier was looking for a defensive coordinator for his first season at Louisiana in 2018, he hired Roberts, who had sniffed other potential jobs but did not leave Southern Louisiana until Napier came calling.

Roberts, Ron (2018 at Louisiana) — **Ron Roberts** left his job as head coach at Southern Louisiana to join **Billy Napier** as his defensive coordinator at Louisiana in 2018. (Photo: **Scott Clause**/USA TODAY Sports Network)

"Football is important to me. It is. I'm a football junkie. That is my hobby; that is my everything else,'' he said. "I don't golf, I don't fish. On Saturday and Sunday, I'm calling somebody else about what they're doing. 'Hey, how are you adjusting this?' That's everything. I was really picky about, you know what I mean, about what I was going to do. I really believe in certain things for the players because if not, you get frustrated. I'm in total sync with everything he believes in. So, it makes it really easy to push him, to back his agenda, to back the culture that he is trying to create, back the atmosphere he is trying to create."

QUOTE OF NOTE

In Roberts' second season at Baylor in 2021, the Bears won 12 games and a Big 12 championship, leading the conference in interceptions (19), turnovers gained (27), turnover margin (0.93) and defensive touchdowns (3). Auburn's defense showed substantial improvement in those areas last season.

Freeze praised Roberts late last season for his ability to be a factor on Saturdays when the pressure is on.

"He's one of the best in the nation at calling a game," Freeze said. "We all have strengths and we all have weaknesses, and you want to play to your strengths. One of his strengths is definitely calling a game-day football game from a defensive perspective and making adjustments in his system. He's really gifted in that."

QUOTING THE GATORS

— "You think about Ron Roberts and what he brings to the table: veteran coach, been a head coach, been a coordinator and a play-caller. Austin and him, there's a mentor-type relationship there. And a ton of respect, mutual respect on both sides, so I think we get the wisdom. They call him the OG, the Godfather. We get him back in the building, and he's going to make us better, and he'll make the players better." – Gators head coach Billy Napier

— "That helps him a lot. And having that experience from another school coming here, that kind of gives him a step ahead of the playbook." – Gators linebacker Shemar James on Roberts' familiarity with Florida's defensive system

— "I think Coach Roberts does a really good job with what he's done in the past and how much knowledge he has. He's brought a lot to the table with not just the linebackers – when it comes to the outside linebackers, the defense as a scheme as a whole. Being able to work with him and Coach Armstrong together is a really good mix to be able to put things together." – Gators linebacker Derek Wingo on the Roberts-Armstrong dynamic