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Even with National Signing Day having come and gone, the Kentucky Wildcats are still finishing up their football staff for next season.
Derrick Ansley became the latest coach to leave Lexington after taking a job with Alabama, leaving UK without their secondary coach of the past three seasons. A new name has surfaced for this vacancy in the form of Texas A&M secondary coach Terry Joseph, according to Scout.com's Patrick Loney.
Why Joseph? Like many of the guys Stoops targets and often ends up hiring, Joseph has experience with multiple members of his staff in addition to having SEC experience. Joseph coached at Nebraska with current UK recruiting coordinator and tight ends coach Vince Marrow. That also came under Bo Pelini, who Stoops is good friends with.
Joseph was also the DBs coach and recruiting coordinator on the same staff as current UK receivers coach Darin Hinshaw from 2010-11 at Tennessee. Joseph is also a former LSU graduate assistant.
As for his current job, Joseph has been with the Aggies since 2014 as a secondary coach. He's been coaching secondary since the 2007 season when he was the secondary coach and recruiting coordinator at Louisiana Tech under Derek Dooley.
Once Dooley went to UT, Joseph followed before leaving for Nebraska from 2012-13. He has a history of compiling strong secondaries from his time at both Nebraska and UT.
In 2012, the Cornhuskers ranked first nationally in opponent completion percentage (47.1 percent), fourth in pass defense (168.2 yards per game) and ninth in opponent pass efficiency (105.32).
During Joseph's stint with the Volts from 2010-11, UT ranked 12th nationally in passing yards allowed in 2011 (177.8) and had 18 interceptions in 2010 to rank 19th nationally.
Given Stoops' history of coaching and developing great defensive backs, he made sure to go after some big-name guys to fill that vacancy. Future Hall of Fame safety Ed Reed got a call from Stoops not long after Ansley left, but Reed opted to stay with the Buffalo Bills instead.
Not long after Reed turned down UK last week, Joseph quickly became someone Stoops looked into in addition to several other coaches. At this point, it's too early to tell who Stoops will pick, but Joseph is in the running for it.