Rich Rodriguez wasn’t in the spotlight early in his career. Photo by Jayne Kamin-Oncea-US PRESSWIRE

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Ah, the good ol’ days. Rich Rodriguez remembers those. Becoming the head coach at Salem University at 24 years old. Taking over at Glenville State two years later, in 1990.

The small college days.

These days, as the first-year head coach at Arizona — and as a guy who has won Big East titles and breathed the air at Michigan — Rodriguez is accustomed to coaching luxury. Assistants to the assistants to the assistants. Yes sir, Coach. Whatever you need, Coach.

Back then, he was just a one-man band making his way in the backwaters of the coaching world.

“My wife lined off the field when I was at Glenville. She was eight months pregnant,” Rodriguez said.

“I made her stop because I was afraid it was going to screw up the child with those fumes from the paint. I said, ‘Honey, I don’t think that’s really good for ol’ junior there.’”

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Jeff Casteel

New Arizona Wildcats coach Rich Rodriguez, having called defensive coordinator the most important position on his coaching staff, finally signed his No. 1 target.

It took longer than he had hoped — Rodriguez said soon after his hiring in late November that he wanted the staff complete by mid-December — but the news release announcing defensive coordinator Jeff Casteel landed Wednesday afternoon.

Arizona also announced the hiring of defensive backs coach David Lockwood, defensive line coach Bill Kirelawich and tight ends coach Spencer Leftwich, completing his nine-man coaching staff.

Casteel will meet with the local media Friday at 11 a.m., with the press conference streamed live on the athletic department’s website.

No contract terms were announced; Casteel had a multi-year deal at West Virginia that would have earned him $575,000 in 2013, but Arizona cannot offer assistant coaches multi-year contacts, athletic director Greg Byrne said.

Casteel, 49, will bring his unusual 3-3-5 stack defense to Arizona; he has had success with the scheme in nine seasons as the Mountaineers’ defensive coordinator, with four top 20 finishes in scoring defense.

Here is more background on the history of Rodriguez and Casteel … and here is a chart of how his defenses ranked at West Virginia, with yards per game and points per game:

The official release from the UA sports information office:

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