Here’s what to know about Penn State’s new offensive analyst, former NFL OC Dowell Loggains
Penn State has hired former NFL offensive coordinator Dowell Loggains as an offensive analyst, a team spokesperson confirmed Friday.
The 40-year-old Loggains fills the vacant position left behind by Ty Howle, who was promoted from offensive analyst to tight ends coach earlier this month after former tight ends coach Tyler Bowen left the program for the same position with the Jacksonville Jaguars. Loggains spent the last two seasons as offensive coordinator of the New York Jets under former head coach Adam Gase.
Loggains has seven years of experience as an NFL offensive coordinator — with stints with the Tennessee Titans, Chicago Bears, Miami Dolphins and Jets — and has been on NFL staffs since 2005.
His road from 2005 in Texas to 2021 in Happy Valley has been a long one.
At 25 years old, Loggains entered the NFL ranks when he was hired as a scouting assistant with the Dallas Cowboys. Then, in 2006, he joined the Titans, where he was first an administrative assistant before being promoted to offensive quality control coordinator in 2008, then to quarterbacks coach in 2010 and offensive coordinator in 2012. But Loggains’ time in Tennessee ended after the 2013 season, when head coach Mike Munchak was fired and he was not retained by the organization.
Loggains’ next stop was with the Cleveland Browns, where he served as the team’s quarterbacks coach in 2014. He was let go after just one season, though.
One of the most impressive years of Loggains’ career was 2015, when he was the quarterbacks coach of the Bears, coaching quarterback Jay Cutler in a season in which he threw for 3,659 yards, 21 touchdowns and 11 interceptions. Cutler also posted career highs that season in passer rating (92.3) and completion rate (64.4%). Loggains spent the next two years — 2016 and 2017 — as the Bears’ offensive coordinator before the organization chose not to retain him following the decision to fire head coach John Fox.
In 2018, Loggains was hired as the offensive coordinator for the Dolphins, where he spent one season before Gase was fired and he was not retained.
But Loggains reunited with Gase in 2019, when Gase was named head coach of the Jets and hired Loggains as the team’s offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach. Gase primarily handled the offensive play-calling duties, though, and the Jets ranked last in the league in total yards of offense in 2019 and 2020. After Gase was fired on Jan. 3, the Jets didn’t retain Loggains.
Now, Loggains joins head coach James Franklin’s staff at Penn State after first developing a relationship with Franklin when the two were in Nashville, Tenn., at the same time — Loggains with the Titans and Franklin as head coach at Vanderbilt.
This story was originally published February 26, 2021 at 5:50 PM.
