FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. (July 27, 2021) – Now more than a decade into it,
Josh Irvin's coaching career has been anything but conventional.
After starting with a two-year stint as a high school coach, just a year after wrapping up his own career at Agoura High School in Southern California, Irvin's tenure as a coach paused while he returned to the field himself.
Unfortunately it took the abrupt end to his playing career to push him back to coaching. After playing at College of the Canyons, Irvin transferred to Chapman where he suffered a season-ending injury ahead of his senior season.
As luck would have it, the Panthers wound up in need of a defensive backs coach and Irvin knew that's where his future lay.
"When I coached at the high school level, that kind of made me fall in love with it," Irvin said. "I was like, 'You know, this is definitely something I can do for the rest of my life'."
Soon he was on the staff at Chapman, spending more than a year as the program's defensive backs coach leading the same group of players he'd played alongside.
"I grew up really fast," Irvin said following his season-ending injury. "They kind of had a feeling that I wanted to coach, I kind of planted it in their head that was kind of a route that I wanted to go. It was a big step for me because I had to really decide how professional I wanted to be because you are coaching some guys that you know, that you went to college with and you played with."
That would just be the beginning of Irvin's unorthodox journey back to Northern Arizona, where he now serves as the Lumberjacks' defensive ends coach and recruiting coordinator after spending a year as a graduate assistant.
And back to is the right word, as Irvin originally arrived in Flagstaff back in 2007 and spent the first year of college at Northern Arizona before returning home to coach at the high school level. Fast-forward a little more than six years and Irvin faced the next bit of adversity in his football journey.
"The hardest years of our lives as coaches, and these players will find out, is that one when you can't play football anymore," said Lumberjacks head coach
Chris Ball, adding the four or five years players have will go by quickly. "I think that's one of the reasons (Josh) works so hard. You know, it was taken away from him and I think he wants these kids to get the most out of this in the short period of time he has."
And there was likely no better test for Irvin than finding the right balance as a coach with players who had grown to know him as a teammate and team captain.
"If this is going to happen the right way, then I need to draw a line and tell those guys this is what it is," Irvin said of his time at Chapman. "I'm a coach and this is how we're going to do things. It helped being in a leadership position to start and then just transitioning over. It was a great learning experience right off the bat."
Looking to further his career by reaching the Division I level and building up connections in the profession, Irvin attended the American Football Coaches Association Convention where he saw Donte Williams speak. Now the cornerbacks coach at USC, Williams coached defensive backs at San Jose State at the time of the convention.
Inspired by the speech and set on moving forward in his career, Irvin decided he needed to find a way onto the Spartans' staff.
"I was just like, that's the guy I want to work for," Irvin said. "Whatever I need to do, I need to work for him because that guy is lights out."
After months of trying to get in touch with Williams, Irvin found his way into the San Jose State offices thanks to a connection with an athletic trainer at the university. Telling Williams he wanted to find a way onto the staff, Irvin waited to hear back if there would be a spot available.
Offered the opportunity to volunteer, Irvin packed up and headed to San Jose with six months worth of money. From there, Irvin said it was time to grind for the next six months. Having saved enough money to get by for half a year, Irvin said the clock was ticking to make enough of an impression to land on the staff in a more permanent manner.
"It was a little bit of a risk, but that's kind of been my career so far," Irvin said, who spent nearly three years with the Spartans as he was offered a graduate assistant position after his first season with the program.
A stop at Humboldt State and a return to San Jose State preceded his move to Northern Arizona, with the connections he sought early in his career paying off. Alonzo Carter, San Jose State's running backs coach, happens to be a close friend of Ball while
Junior Taylor and Noah Sutherland played with Irvin's brother at UCLA.
With all signs pointing that the path back to Flagstaff stood as an obvious choice, Irvin wound up as a graduate assistant leading the Lumberjacks' defensive ends during their delayed spring season.
"When we hired him as a GA, he said, 'You'll end up hiring this guy full time' and he was right," Ball said of a conversation with Carter. "He's paid his dues.... He's ready to go."
Promoted to a full-time position this summer, Irvin said he knew he wanted to stick around Northern Arizona by any means necessary.
"After being here for a little bit and getting to know these guys, it's just like I didn't see myself going any other place," Irvin said. "Even if they didn't hire me full-time, I would still be here as a GA because I love the environment. It was a little bit of a risk, but I knew that if I was going into a place that I liked to work, then it wasn't really a risk at all."
