Rutgers football has hired former Drake defensive line coach Joe Evans as its new assistant defensive line coach, according to a report from Brian Fonseca of New Jersey Advanced Media. Evans joins the Rutgers coaching staff after just one season as an assistant to Drake. Evans joins rushing ends coach Joe Woodley and safeties coach Adam Cox as former Drake coaches now on the Rutgers defensive coaching staff.
In his lone season at Drake, Evans helped develop defensive lineman Jacob Auen, who had six sacks last season, Nolan Korzeniowski, who had four sacks last season, and Gene Blalock, who also had four sacks last season.
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Evans joined the Drake coaching staff after having a standout college career at Iowa. After walking on at Iowa in 2019, Evans finished his college career with 135 total tackles, 35.0 tackles for loss, 28.0 sacks, four forced fumbles and one fumble recovery. Evans faced Rutgers during his time at Iowa, terrorizing the Knights in their 2022 game, recording four sacks in the Hawkeyes’ 27-10 win over Rutgers.
Evans went undrafted after leaving college, but landed on the Baltimore Ravens’ practice squad in 2024 for a brief stint before being released.
Evans will now work under new Rutgers defensive line coach Dennis Dottin-Carter.
