Oregon State football’s ‘coaching sponge’ AJ Cooper named to AFCA 35 under 35
Published 12:00 pm Saturday, December 14, 2024
- Oregon State linebackers coach AJ Cooper high-fives freshman linebacker Dexter Foster during the Beavers' 28-0 loss to Air Force on Nov. 16. Cooper was named to the AFCA's 35 Under 35 leadership summit
The 2024 Oregon State football coaching staff employed not just one head coach, but two.
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Trent Bray is the obvious one, taking over as the Beavers’ front man after former head coach Jonathan Smith left the role in a whirlwind and Bray, the then-defensive coordinator and linebackers coach, was swiftly hired to replace him.
It was the man who Bray called upon to replace his own role coaching linebackers, AJ Cooper, who accounts for the second.
Cooper, a two-time national champion and four-year starting cornerback at Southern Oregon, obviously isn’t a head coach yet. But at just 28 years old, Cooper was given the reigns of the linebacker room — one of the youngest and least experience position groups on the 2024 roster — by Bray himself.
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It’s one thing to be recognized internally, but earning the same level of respect outside the walls of a program is another thing.
Cooper has checked both boxes on his meteoric rise through the ranks, being named one of the American Football Coaches Association’s 35 Under 35. The nomination comes with an invite to a leadership summit for young coaches, from preps to the NFL.
“It’s just a great opportunity to be around great coaches and leaders and to continue to learn the profession,” Cooper said about his nomination.
The leadership summit — which has seen names like Oregon offensive coordinator Will Stein, University of South Florida head coach Alex Golesh and Texas State head coach GJ Kinne attend in the past five years — selected Cooper and 34 others from an applicant pool of over 200 coaches.
Not only is it an opportunity to network and learn, but also a litmus test of the rising names in the sport.
Golesh was a tight ends coach at Iowa State and Kinne was Hawaii’s offensive coordinator when they attended. Stein was the OC at UTSA when he was selected and will be a head coaching candidate for 2026 if he isn’t this offseason.
If the nomination means anything more than a seat at the table, defensive coordinator and head coach are titles Cooper is likely to earn should his trajectory continue trending the way it is.
“I’m a note taker and a sponge when it comes to really anything,” Cooper said about what he’s excited for at the summit. “(I want to apply) what I learned to my style and my coaching, not just a robot copycatting what someone else is doing.”
Cooper got his start in coaching in 2019, following the conclusion of his playing career at SOU. A two-year stint as a graduate assistant and coaching cornerbacks at Central Washington led to another GA job with Oregon State under Smith and Bray from 2021 to 2022 before Cooper accepted the role of linebackers coach at FCS Sacramento State in 2023.
He returned to the Beavers in the same role he held as a Hornet in 2024, leading the inside linebackers.
Although he played cornerback for SOU, Cooper has worked with all three levels of a defense in his five years of coaching. The depth of his knowledge — from the secondary to defensive line — is apparent when Cooper explained the article he turned in to the AFCA as a part of his application.
“I chose to write about linebackers, the fundamentals (of the position) and eye progression,” Cooper said. “(It’s stuff) that you can teach to guys on the elementary level to better their eyes. Obviously there’s deeper insight into some of that stuff, but it’s something that will always be a part of the game at any position.”
The versatility and wisdom paint a picture of why Bray and defensive coordinator Keith Heyward were so willing to hand the keys of the defense’s play callers over to someone as young as Cooper. His youth is one of the things he credits as helping keep him connected with a position headlined by underclassmen in redshirt freshman Isaiah Chisom, redshirt sophomore Melvin Jordan IV and true freshman Dexter Foster.
“I use (my age) to my advantage. I try to relate myself to them and let them know I’m just like them,” Cooper said in reference to his linebacker corps. “We’re the youngest ones doing it, so we all figure things out together. We go through adversity together. We grow together and continue to develop.”
Like Cooper said, it was a year of development for himself and his linebackers. And while two of the aforementioned three — Isaiah Chisom and Melvin Jordan IV — have entered the transfer portal, the development was clear.
Chisom and Jordan IV both went from finishing week one against Idaho State with respective Pro Football Focus grades of 48.9 and 57.2, to Jordan IV finishing the season as the Beavers’ highest-graded defender and Chisom’s highest-graded weeks coming against Air Force in week 12 and Boise State in week 14.
“The longer we play, the better we get. Those guys took big steps.” Cooper said, reflecting on the progression of his linebackers. “They did a lot better at identifying things (as the year went on) and foreseeing what would come. Their study habits got better as they figured out what worked for them… They started to figure out what it took to go out there and give themselves the best chance to win.”
While another promotion or two are in Cooper’s mind, he says he’s happy in Corvallis.
“I’m always where my feet are,” Cooper said. “In this position, I’m just trying to be the best linebacker coach I can be… (But still) identifying what I would like to do and who I would be as a defensive coordinator and learning every position because, at some point, I’m going to have to teach that to somebody else to get an understanding of what I would like to get done.”
Cooper remains planted in Corvallis and ready to retool his linebacking corps with the two recent transfers. But when the opportunity comes knocking, he knows what an AJ Cooper-led defense will look like.
“It’s going to be aggressive (and) attacking,” Cooper said. “We’re going to play tight coverage and be pressure-oriented when we get to third down. But (I’d) like to be attacking up front (and) simple in normal down and distance… Then get exotic on third down and attacking them so that way you always keep (opponents) on their heels and we dictate the terms.”
Now in the thick of the offseason, Cooper and the rest of the Beavers will be back for spring ball in April 2025 before the regular season gets underway in August.