Matt Balis new strength coach? From Miss State?
- Thread starter noeynox
- Start date
- Status
- Joined
- Aug 28, 2011
- Messages
- 27,760
- Reaction Score
- 71,179
STARKVILLE - Mississippi State strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis is leaving his position with the Bulldogs program to take a similar position at Connecticut.
MSU football spokespeople confirmed the news to The Dispatch MSU Sports Blog Thursday afternoon.
Balis, who had been the strength and conditioning coach under Mullen since he was hired as the head coach at MSU, has often been referred by Mullen as "the most important part of his program" and has called him ""the best strength coach in the country".
Balis will be working under new head coach Bob Diaco with the Huskies program. UConn hired the 40-year-old Notre Dame defensive coordinator as its new head coach on Dec. 11. Diaco takes over a team that went 3-9 this season, and fired Paul Pasqualoni after an 0-4 start and an 10-18 record in just over two years at the school.
Balis came to Starkville from Virginia, where he served two years as the strength and conditioning coach for the Cavaliers' football program. Prior to his stint in Charlottesville, Balis previously served as the assistant director of strength and conditioning at Florida in 2005 and 2006 when Mullen was the offensive coordinator with the Gators. The Florida football team completed the 2006 season with a 13-1 record and won the Southeastern Conference Championship and the BCS National Championship.
Before joining the staff at Florida, Balis worked two years at Utah as the director of strength and conditioning for the entire 16-sport program in 2004 when Mullen was the quarterbacks coach with the Utes football program. Balis was directly in charge of designing and implementing strength and conditioning programs for football, men's basketball, women's basketball, baseball and volleyball. The football team completed the 2004 season with an overall record of 12-0 and won the Fiesta Bowl. He served as assistant strength coach at Utah in 2003.
Balis was also an assistant strength coach at Houston for two years and before moving to the college level, he was an assistant football coach and worked in the area of strength and conditioning at Wheaton (Ill.) Warrenville South High School for two years and at Wheaton (Ill.) North High School for three years. He also taught physical education at the elementary school level during that five-year period.
(I added the bold.)
Read more: http://www.cdispatch.com/msusports/article.asp?aid=30232#ixzz2pvpOGTQQ
MSU football spokespeople confirmed the news to The Dispatch MSU Sports Blog Thursday afternoon.
Balis, who had been the strength and conditioning coach under Mullen since he was hired as the head coach at MSU, has often been referred by Mullen as "the most important part of his program" and has called him ""the best strength coach in the country".
Balis will be working under new head coach Bob Diaco with the Huskies program. UConn hired the 40-year-old Notre Dame defensive coordinator as its new head coach on Dec. 11. Diaco takes over a team that went 3-9 this season, and fired Paul Pasqualoni after an 0-4 start and an 10-18 record in just over two years at the school.
Balis came to Starkville from Virginia, where he served two years as the strength and conditioning coach for the Cavaliers' football program. Prior to his stint in Charlottesville, Balis previously served as the assistant director of strength and conditioning at Florida in 2005 and 2006 when Mullen was the offensive coordinator with the Gators. The Florida football team completed the 2006 season with a 13-1 record and won the Southeastern Conference Championship and the BCS National Championship.
Before joining the staff at Florida, Balis worked two years at Utah as the director of strength and conditioning for the entire 16-sport program in 2004 when Mullen was the quarterbacks coach with the Utes football program. Balis was directly in charge of designing and implementing strength and conditioning programs for football, men's basketball, women's basketball, baseball and volleyball. The football team completed the 2004 season with an overall record of 12-0 and won the Fiesta Bowl. He served as assistant strength coach at Utah in 2003.
Balis was also an assistant strength coach at Houston for two years and before moving to the college level, he was an assistant football coach and worked in the area of strength and conditioning at Wheaton (Ill.) Warrenville South High School for two years and at Wheaton (Ill.) North High School for three years. He also taught physical education at the elementary school level during that five-year period.
(I added the bold.)
Read more: http://www.cdispatch.com/msusports/article.asp?aid=30232#ixzz2pvpOGTQQ
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 7,401
- Reaction Score
- 18,886
Saw it on the BY too. 
http://the-boneyard.com/threads/2014-uconn-coaching-staff-announced.50626/page-3#post-811647
Not technically coaching staff but...
MSU strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis leaving Bulldogs program for UConn
Read more: http://cdispatch.com/msusports/article.asp?aid=30232#ixzz2pvWBepNM
>>Balis, who had been the strength and conditioning coach under Mullen since he was hired as the head coach at MSU, has often been referred by Mullen as "the most important part of his program" and has called him ""the best strength coach in the country"<<
Another UVA connection.
http://the-boneyard.com/threads/2014-uconn-coaching-staff-announced.50626/page-3#post-811647
Not technically coaching staff but...
MSU strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis leaving Bulldogs program for UConn
Read more: http://cdispatch.com/msusports/article.asp?aid=30232#ixzz2pvWBepNM
>>Balis, who had been the strength and conditioning coach under Mullen since he was hired as the head coach at MSU, has often been referred by Mullen as "the most important part of his program" and has called him ""the best strength coach in the country"<<
Another UVA connection.
Husky25
Dink & Dunk beat the Greatest Show on Turf.
- Joined
- Sep 10, 2012
- Messages
- 18,573
- Reaction Score
- 19,556
It's in the Diaco announces his staff thread.
- Joined
- Aug 30, 2011
- Messages
- 7,522
- Reaction Score
- 25,168
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 21,132
- Reaction Score
- 48,079
Change is hard. People are loyal those who have done right by them. Its BD's ship now.
- Joined
- Aug 27, 2011
- Messages
- 7,498
- Reaction Score
- 15,682
I agree...it is funny how they were on the dump Pasqualoni and Co band wagon..and now are not happy about Martin being replaced. Up until last season Martin had nothing to do with the football team anyway. Pasqualoni had brought in his own guy with him from the Cowboys.
Fairfield_1st
Sitting on this Barstool talking like a damn fool
- Joined
- Nov 16, 2012
- Messages
- 2,663
- Reaction Score
- 8,455
Will he support all programs or is he specifically for football? If all sports I'd expect it to come from Warde.
- Joined
- Aug 29, 2011
- Messages
- 422
- Reaction Score
- 1,114
Im pretty sure he had plenty to do with the football program under Randy....and its all Randy's guys that are upset
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 7,401
- Reaction Score
- 18,886
That's weird, because I had heard Martin didn't let the guys crank the tunes during work outs, but after PGDL left TJ let them turn it up.
Jax Husky
Larry Taylor did nothing wrong
- Joined
- Aug 27, 2011
- Messages
- 2,991
- Reaction Score
- 4,762
No comment on letting Martin go, but I am always suspect of letting former players have a lot of input on the program with new coaches. There always seems to be some kind of conflict.
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 1,185
- Reaction Score
- 3,230
The records of the teams that Balis has been the strength and conditioning coach for were always very good. This appears to be another nice get for Diaco. The MSU fans seem to appreciate both the magnitude of their program's loss as well as in a state of disbelief that they lost him to...UConn. I'm getting the impression that this is just the beginning of Diaco and UConn surprising a lot of folks in the traditional college football establishment 
*Also posted in "Coaching Staff thread
*Also posted in "Coaching Staff thread
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 2,988
- Reaction Score
- 10,632
We gonna have to go with Diaco on this one. Diaco has the right to get the people he feels that he is compatible with.
- Joined
- Aug 27, 2011
- Messages
- 13,362
- Reaction Score
- 33,634
With all due respect to the former players, pipe down.
uconnbill
A Half full kind of guy
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 8,576
- Reaction Score
- 15,264
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 92,440
- Reaction Score
- 356,313
Saw it on the BY too.
http://the-boneyard.com/threads/2014-uconn-coaching-staff-announced.50626/page-3#post-811647
Not technically coaching staff but...
MSU strength and conditioning coach Matt Balis leaving Bulldogs program for UConn
Read more: http://cdispatch.com/msusports/article.asp?aid=30232#ixzz2pvWBepNM
>>Balis, who had been the strength and conditioning coach under Mullen since he was hired as the head coach at MSU, has often been referred by Mullen as "the most important part of his program" and has called him ""the best strength coach in the country"<<
Another UVA connection.
http://blogs.clarionledger.com/msu/...-uconn/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
>>Matt Balis will leave his positions at strength and conditioning coach at Mississippi State for the same role at UConn a university spokesperson confirmed on Thursday.
Balis spent five season with Mississippi State under coach Dan Mullen. The fifth-year head coach has called Balis “The best strength coach in the country.” Balis was also with Mullen at Utah in 2003 and 2004. In his second year he became the Director of Strength and Condition for the Utes.
In 2010, Balis was named one of three finalists for the FootballScoop Strength and Conditioning Coach of the Year.
Prior to coaching in Starkville, Balis spent two years at Virginia as the Director of Strength and Conditioning.<<
CTMike
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 11,380
- Reaction Score
- 40,604
Based on some tweets, even goes back to players before Randy.
- Status