Back in June of 2020, West Virginia announced that that defensive coordinator Vic Koenning was placed on administrative leave, and he later reached a separation agreement with the school that left Neal Brown in the unenviable position of looking to fill a defensive coordinator job at the 11th hour of the summer heading into fall camp.
They decided to use a unique defensive coordinator by committee approach for the 2020 season that saw Jordan Lesley and Jamile Addae share the play calling duties, without any official title change. Results weren't great, as the Mountaineers struggled to a 5-7 finish.
Heading into the 2020 season, that situation changed, as Lesley was appointed the team's defensive coordinator while also moving from defensive line to outside linebackers.
Brown pushing his chips in on Lesley paid off. The first-year defensive coordinator at the FBS level helped turn around a defense that went from ranking 78th nationally scoring in 2019 to 21st in 2020 and they improved in a number of other key areas as well.
In December, Lesley was nominated for the Broyles Award, which is annually given to the top assistant coach in college football.
According to a report from Mike Casazza, Lesley has been rewarded with a contract extension that includes some new language and some "clever money."
No specific details have been provided yet on the new deal, but we will update the piece when they're available.
Based on the USA Today assistant coaches salary database, we know that Lesley made $341k last season, and the 2019 season he served as de-facto co-defensive coordinator and defensive line coach he made $250k while Vic Koenning was set to make $650k before leaving the program.
Prior to joining Brown's staff in Morgantown, the Brown and Lesley worked together at Troy for three seasons and Lesley spent a few seasons as the defensive coordinator at the junior college level prior to that as well at East Mississippi, Northwest Mississippi CC, and Kilgore College.
Stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.