PISCATAWAY – Robb Smith didn’t need much of a reintroduction to Rutgers football.
He was plenty familiar with both the Scarlet Knights and coach Greg Schiano.
Smith returned to Rutgers in February as co-defensive coordinator, embarking on his third stint in Piscataway and fourth with Schiano.
“I’m ecstatic to be back,” Smith said Tuesday following the Scarlet Knights’ third spring practice. “My wife jokes with me that it’s kind of like a lost dog that finds it way home. This really is home. Just a couple blocks over, my children spent a lot of their formative years. There’s not a person in the football universe that I align myself more than with Greg Schiano. It’s been awesome to be back.”
The next one will be an important one for Smith, who spent the previous two seasons as a defensive analyst on James Franklin’s staff at Penn State.
The Scarlet Knights return several impact players on defense, notably linebackers Dariel Djabome and Mohamed Toure, as well as defensive end Jordan Thompson, safety Kaj Sanders and cornerback Bo Mascoe among others.
“Our relationship went pretty far back,” said Thompson, who was recruited by Smith as part of the 2021 recruiting class. “It was awesome (to have him back), honestly.”
But Smith and his defensive assistants also need to integrate seven transfers into the system, including Penn State transfer defensive back Cam Miller.
“The biggest thing to me right now is putting in that system,” Smith said. “There’s a lot of things that are the same, there are some things that are different. So our guys are communicating together, how they’re playing together. Just basically, how we’re going to do things together.”
Smith and Schiano brought in Bergen Catholic graduate Zach Sparber as Smith’s co-defensive coordinator – they worked together at Duke in 2022 when Smith was the defensive coordinator and Sparber was a graduate assistant working with the linebackers.
While Smith is a veteran coach, Sparber’s an up-and-comer who’s getting a big opportunity with Rutgers.
