2/18/2020 football Edit

Huskers hire Rutledge as senior special teams analyst

Sean Callahan • InsideNebraska

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Sean Callahan has worked with Rivals.com since 2000, and has been the Publisher of HuskerOnline since 2007. He also reports for KETV Channel 7 in Omaha, NET's Big Red Wrap-Up and KFAB Radio in Omaha.

Nebraska has officially hired their man to run special teams in 2020.

HuskerOnline first reported on Friday that Auburn's Jonathan Rutledge was heading to NU as a special teams analyst, and he officially announced the move Tuesday via Twitter. The Huskers.com website lists Rutledge as NU’s senior special teams analyst.

Rutledge has spent the last two seasons working under Gus Malzahn at Auburn running special teams with full-time assistant coach Larry Porter. Before that, he spent two years (2016-17) at Missouri with Barry Odom. He also was a graduate assistant coach at both North Carolina and Memphis.

An Ole Miss graduate, Rutledge was an equipment manager for the Rebels for four years, working exclusively with the quarterbacks. He graduated from Oxford in 2011,

Kansas State's Sean Snyder was originally targeted for the special teams analyst position at NU, but recently took a full-time assistant job at USC.

In his analyst role, Rutledge will replace Jovan Dewitt, who left the Husker staff for North Carolina after the 2019 season.

Mike Dawson replaced Dewitt on staff to coach outside linebackers but currently doesn't have any special teams duties next to his name.

It's still unknown how the entire staff will assist Rutledge with running special teams, since technically as an analyst his onfield coaching responsibilities are limited.