Inoke Breckterfield, who coached Wisconsin’s defensive line coach for six seasons, has announced he has joined the new staff at Vanderbilt under Clark Lea.

Breckterfield joined the staff at Wisconsin after three years of coaching defensive tackles at Pittsburgh, where his best-known player was Aaron Donald, a first-round pick of the St. Louis Rams in the 2014 NFL Draft. Donald was drafted after a senior season that saw the consensus All-American sweep the nation’s top defensive honors by claiming the Bronko Nagurski Trophy, Chuck Bednarik Award, Outland Trophy and Rotary Lombardi Award. Donald led the nation with 28.5 tackles for loss and ranked 11th in the country with 11.0 sacks as a senior.

Wisconsin has had a strong run defense and overall defense for years. The Badgers led the Big Ten in total defense and run defense this past season. Before the 2020 season, the Badgers allowed an average of just 16.5 points per game since Breckterfield joined the coaching staff, ranked No. 3 nationally over those five years. UW also stood third in both rushing defense (109.0 ypg) and pass efficiency defense (106.6) over the course of those seasons.

Before Pitt, Breckterfield coached at UCLA and Montana.

He was a defensive end at Oregon State, and finished his collegiate career as the Beavers’ career leader in tackles for loss (55.5) and sacks (19.5), according to his Wisconsin bio. As a senior in 1998, he was named an Associated Press All-American (third team) and the Pac-10’s Morris Trophy Award recipient as the top defensive lineman in the league as voted on by Pac-10 offensive linemen.