Staten Island, NY – Former Wagner College football players and coaches continue to be represented at the highest level of the sport.
Most recently, former Seahawk assistant coach Keith Carter was named the New York Jets offensive line coach.
A 2005 graduate of UCLA, Carter played for Bruins from 2001-05 at both tight end and halfback. The Downington, PA native was an integral part of the UCLA offense, playing in the Silicon Valley Bowl his junior season of 2003, and the Las Vegas Bowl during his senior season of 2004.
Carter was the Seahawks' tight ends coach during the 2006 season, earned a Master's Degree in Secondary Education from Wagner in 2007, and has served as an NFL assistant since 2012. Most recently, Carter served the past five seasons as the Tennessee Titans' offensive line coach.
Replacing Carter as the offensive line coach in Tennessee will be former Wagner head coach Jason Houghtaling, who worked as an assistant coach for the Titans throughout the last two seasons. Houghtaling served as Wagner's head coach for five seasons and arrived in Tennessee after spending 2020 as the offensive line coach at Colgate.
The newest NFL assistant with ties to Grymes Hill is former wide receivers coach Junior Taylor, who has been named an assistant wide receivers coach for the Jets. The former UCLA standout coached Wagner's wideouts in 2018 and was most recently in charge of the receivers at Northern Arizona.
The third and longest tenured New York Jets assistant with ties to Grymes Hill is former Wagner offensive coordinator Rob Calabrese, who will enter his third season as the Jets' quarterbacks coach. Between 2016-18, Calabrese worked with Wagner's offense in various roles and helped direct an offense that averaged 28 points per game in 2018, an almost seven point per game improvement from the previous season, and the school's best average in nine seasons.
Widely regarded as one of the top coordinators in all of football, Wagner graduate Lou Anarumo will return as the Cincinnati Bengals' defensive coordinator in 2023. Anarumo is entering his 12th season as an NFL coach in 2023, and fifth with Cincinnati, after joining the Bengals in 2019 as defensive coordinator.
A Staten Island native, Anarumo earned his B.S. degree in special education from Wagner in 1990. While in college, he served as head junior varsity coach at his high school alma mater, Susan Wagner High School, where he had previously played quarterback. Anarumo served as the part-time running backs coach at Wagner in 1990.
Wagner is one of six colleges where Anarumo has worked as an assistant coach, a list that includes Purdue, Harvard, Marshall, the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and Syracuse, before breaking into the NFL with the Miami Dolphins in 2012.
The second NFL defensive coordinator with ties to the NFL is Patrick Graham, who completed his first season with the Las Vegas Raiders and 14
th year in the NFL in 2022. Graham, who previously served as the defensive coordinator for the New York Giants and Miami Dolphins instructed the Seahawk tight ends and assisted with the offensive line in 2002 and worked with the defensive tackles and assisted on special teams in 2003 under
Walt Hameline. Graham also coached the Seahawk junior varsity football team to an undefeated season while serving as strength and conditioning coach and academic coordinator.
Graham was a defensive lineman at Yale University, graduating with a Bachelor's degree in sociology in 2002. His first coaching assignment was on Grymes Hill where he spent the 2002 and 2003 seasons as a graduate assistant while also studying for an MBA with a concentration in finance.
Justin Hinds enters his second season with the Chicago Bears as a defensive line assistant. Hinds coached defensive linemen and outside linebackers in 2012-13 at Wagner, where he earned a Master's degree.
Hinds was part of Wagner's historic 2012 team, as the Seahawks won their first NEC Football Championship in school history before becoming the first Northeast Conference (NEC) team to post a win in the NCAA FCS Playoffs with a 31-20 victory over Patriot League Champion Colgate.
Other NFL personnel with ties to the Seahawks include Philadelphia Eagles senior pro scout Matt Holland and Kansas City Chiefs Director of Player Personnel / College Scouting Ryne Nutt.
On the field, four former Seahawks were under contract in the NFL during the 2022 season.
Former Wagner All-American
Cam Gill missed the 2022 season with an injury. Gill won the Super Bowl with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers following a convincing 31-9 victory over Kansas City. Gill competed in his second season with the Bucs in 2021, seeing increased playing time on defense and recording 1.5 sacks throughout the season.
Former Wagner defensive tackle Chris Williams appeared in five games for the Indianapolis Colts during the 2022 season, making two tackles in the process. The former All-NEC defensive tackle will enter his third NFL season in 2023.
Former two-sport standout Greg Senat closed out last season with the Jets after being claimed off waivers in early January, but did not appear in any games. Prior to his stint with the Jets, Senat spent parts of the 2021 season with the Cleveland Browns and Indianapolis Colts. Senat won the Super Bowl with the Kansas City Chiefs in 2020 year after being drafted by Baltimore in the sixth round of the 2018 NFL Draft and spending his first NFL season with the Ravens.
A four-year member of the Seahawk men's basketball team, Senat went on football scholarship prior to the 2016 season and became a fixture on the Seahawk offensive line, starting all 22 games that he played in during his two-year gridiron career
In 2016-17, the Long Island native helped the Wagner hoops team to a 16-14 season as a senior before competing solely in football during the 2017 season as a fifth-year senior.
Former Seahawk Julian Stanford re-signed with the Carolina Panthers on a one-year contract before finishing the 2022 season with the Buffalo Bills. The longest-tenured former Seahawk in the NFL has been playing professional football since 2012 and enters the offseason as a free agent.
In the Canadian Football League, former Seahawk defensive lineman Charbel Dabire appeared in 15 games for the Saskatchewan Roughriders. The six-foot-one, 290-pounder played 15 games for the Riders last season, recording 10 defensive tackles, one tackle for loss and two sacks. The 25-year-old was selected in the fifth round, 44th overall, by the Riders in the 2019 CFL Draft. He has played in 37 career regular season games and three playoff games for the Riders, amassing 24 defensive tackles, one special team tackle and four sacks.
Dabire's former teammate, Julian McCleod, appeared in four games for the Toronto Argonauts in 2022. McCleod signed with the Argos in 2020 and spent time on the team's practice squad in 2021 before an injury sidelined him for the rest of the season.
At Wagner, McCleod finished the 2019 season with 38 total tackles and three sacks, including consecutive games with sacks against Robert Morris and Duquesne. The Florida native played in all 45 games of his Seahawk career and finished with 102 total tackles, setting new career highs each season.
Among Division I Power 5 schools, former Seahawk Adam Fuller continues to lead as Florida State's defensive coordinator. From 1999-2004 Fuller coached at Wagner, starting as linebackers coach for two seasons before taking over the defensive backs and adding special teams coordinator duties. His final season he was the co-defensive coordinator. Fuller earned a Master's degree in secondary education from Wagner in 2001.
Additionally, former Wagner defensive line coach Terrance Knighton will serve as the defensive line coach at Nebraska after spending the 2022 season as an assistant with the Carolina Panthers. The NFL veteran coached the Seahawks' defensive line in 2019. He played in more than 100 games during his seven-year professional career. Knighton tallied 231 tackles from 2009 to 2015, ranking in the top 15 of all NFL defensive tackles during that time frame.
On Staten Island, Wagner will start spring football in March, with the annual Green & White game scheduled for April 15.
