Kentucky taps NFL Rams assistant Coen to guide its offense

Updated Dec. 15, 2020 3:45 p.m. ET

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LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) — Kentucky coach Mark Stoops has hired Los Angeles Rams assistant Liam Coen as offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach to revive the Southeastern Conference's worst passing game.

Coen, 35, was named the Rams’ assistant quarterbacks coach before this season after two as the NFL club's wide receivers’ assistant. He will join the program after the season with Los Angeles, which reached the Super Bowl in 2018 and currently leads the NFC West. Coen works with Pro Bowl QB Jared Goff and has helped the receiver corps produce a 1,000-yard duo each of the past two seasons.

Coen replaces Eddie Gran, who was let go last week along with quarterbacks coach Darin Hinshaw after Kentucky averaged just 124.4 yards per game this season and was Stoops’ main focus for improvement.

“There’s many different styles that you can go with in today’s day and age with college football,” Stoops said Tuesday in a virtual news conference, “but I also had to go with something that I was comfortable with and could mesh with the good things that we’ve been doing and what we wanted to look like.

“Certainly, you don’t have to look very far to look at L.A.’s offense to know that they are very creative and very innovative with what they’re doing offensively.”

Before the Rams, Coen coached collegiately in similar capacities at Maine, UMass, Rhode Island and Brown, where he worked two stints after guiding the Minutemen to a FCS championship runner-up finish in 2006. He also played in 2009 in the Arena Football League.

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