Florida Football: Who is Gators analyst Eric Kiesau?

In case you haven’t heard, the sky is falling for Florida football and Billy Napier needs a wide receivers coach. A lot of names have been floated around, including Jeff Scott and Ike Hilliard.

But the potential solution to Napier’s quandary may already be sitting on his staff.

Florida Football: It’s all about connections

Eric Kiesau is a veteran coach that got his start in 2000 as the running backs coach at Utah State. During his accent up the college football ladder, he was the wide receiver coach at California from 2002 to 2005 and in 2011. While at Cal, Kiesau worked with both Deshawn Jackson and Keenan Allen.

Kiesau was given the opportunity to be the offensive coordinator for Boise State in 2020 and then came to Auburn in 2021. He was Auburn’s offensive coordinator in 2022 but was fired after one season.

Napier brought Kiesau onto the Florida football staff as an offensive analyst last month.

Kiesau and Napier crossed paths in 2015 when both worked at Alabama under Nick Saban. Napier was the WR coach at the time and Kiesau was brought on as an analyst.

While Kiesau’s time as offensive coordinator for Auburn might not have worked out as the Tigers only averaged 23.2 points per game last season and were 90th in the country, he has the pedigree to be a successful position coach.

Looking through his history, wide receiver play has been solid at all of his stops. For as anemic as Auburn’s offense was last year, Ja’Varrius Johnson was a bright spot at wide receiver and was 13th in the country in yards per catch.

And what makes a position coach successful isn’t necessarily what makes an offensive coordinator successful.

So while Ike Hillard may be the bigger name for Gator Nation and would probably energize the fan base a bit more, Eric Kiesau is a capable wide receivers coach if he is the one tabbed by Napier.