Peterson Bringing ‘Servant Mentality’ to Defensive Coordinator Post
Jan 02, 2026 | Football, Sports Extra
By: D. Scott Fritchen
He's a Texas A&M alum who faced the purple and white as a player and then as a member of the coaching staff, and later he served as defensive coach for four years at Kansas, but today, after a 36-hour whirlwind trip to see current Kansas State players, Jordan Peterson wears a purple quarter-zip with a silver Powercat and a gray cap that reads "CATS" as he sits at a table by Bill Snyder Family Stadum.
"It's awesome," Peterson says.
He smiles.
"Collin Klein is undefeated against me, so if I can't beat him, I have to join him," Peterson says. "So, here we go."
Klein named Peterson as K-State's new defensive coordinator after spending two seasons with Peterson on staff at Texas A&M, where Klein served as offensive coordinator, and Peterson served as co-defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach.
A native of Lexington, Texas, Peterson has five years of coordinator experience and has spent six years on Big 12 staffs, having served as a graduate assistant at Texas A&M in 2010 and 2011 — the Aggies' final two years in the conference — in addition to being a defensive assistant at Kansas between 2020 and 2023.
"We had some run-ins with the K-State Wildcats, first as a coach and a player," Peterson says, chuckling. "It's good to be on this side of things. I played at A&M and ran into playing K-State in 2005-09, and then I severed as a GA in 2010-11, so I was there for the four-overtime game with Collin. Then, obviously, I was at the other school in Kansas for four years."
Peterson's journey as a position coach began at Fresno State, first as a defensive secondary coach in 2012-14 and then as outside linebackers coach and recruiting coordinator in 2015-16. He coached safeties and served as defensive passing game coordinator and the defensive coordinator at New Mexico between 2017-2019, then reached the Power 4 level at Kansas. In 2020, he coached safeties. In 2021, he was senior defensive analyst. In 2022, he coached defensive backs. In 2023, he served as defensive backs coach and defensive passing game coordinator.
After four years at Kansas, Peterson moved to Texas A&M, where his defenses were at another level and got better. This past season, the Aggies ranked first in the country in third down defense, second in sacks, third in tackles for loss, 16th in passing yards allowed, 19th in total defense, and 22nd in fourth down defense.
And now Peterson is with Klein. In Manhattan. Wearing purple. And he's on a mission.
"If you want to be the MOB, you'd better come with the MOB mentality," Peterson says. "We are going to play fast, physical, violent freaking football. That's what it's going to be."
Peterson spoke with K-State Sports Extra's D. Scott Fritchen about his journey to K-State, defensive schematics, styles, rosters, and, of course, the Wildcats' four-overtime win over the Aggies on November 12, 2011 at Bill Snyder Family Stadium:
JORDAN PETERSON: We had some run-ins with the K-State Wildcats, first as a coach and a player. It's good to be on this side of things. I played at A&M and ran into playing K-State in 2005-09, and then I severed as a GA in 2010-11 so I was there for the four-overtime game with Collin. Then, obviously, I was at the other school in Kansas for four years. Collin Klein is undefeated against me, so if I can't beat him, I have to join him. So, here we go.
D. SCOTT FRITCHEN: So, since we're on topic, take me back to K-State's 53-30 win over Texas A&M in four overtimes on November 12, 2011, at Bill Snyder Family Stadium. Collin Klein plowed his way into the end zone for the game-winning touchdown, his sixth touchdown in the longest game in Big 12 history. An amazing game.
PETERSON: I was on the sideline as a GA, and the things that stick out in my mind is obviously the grit of that game. It was a battle on both sides. From the secondary standpoint, we got beat on our quarters and were playing cover-4, so we joke about that all the time. As a coach and a player, you remember the negative things, so Collin says, "Yeah, I threw a corner route on a cover-3 and luckily I sold it, and it didn't hurt us." So, he's remembering the negative things he did, and I'm remembering the negative things on our side. That was a heck of a game. Heck of a game.
FRITCHEN: Now we're here. Things move fast this day in age in college football these days.
PETERSON: Yes, pretty fast.
FRITCHEN: On December 20, you bid farewell to a two-year stint a co-defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach at your alma mater, Texas A&M, and the very next day you are announced as the new defensive coordinator at Kansas State. Can you walk me through the days building up to Texas A&M's playoff game and then the day after the game and exactly how everything transpired?
PETERSON: Obviously, Coach Klein and I have a really good relationship. I feel very confident in who he is, what he's about, the priorities he's set, and the foundation in which he builds everything, and he builds everything on relationships. So, in the two years that we were at Texas A&M, our families got really close, so there were a lot of things aligned in not just from the football side of things but from the personal side of things.
Leading up to the College Football Playoff, we wanted to focus as much as we could on the game against Miami knowing this was coming. We didn't want to make any kind of announcement because of the timing and distractions and what not, but we also knew we needed to get boots on the ground and get rolling. We talked about this roster, where we have to insert pieces to address deficiencies or a lack of depth, so the day after the game, we met as a staff at A&M and it was like, "OK, I'm going here, here and here," and hit the ground running. We made phone calls to our K-State current roster as fast as we possibly could, and got on Zooms, and attacked this thing. You're trying to do two things at the same time. You're trying to meet and build the trust factor within the current roster and at the same time talk about the vision of what this defense is going to be moving forward.
This day in age with the transfer portal, you're basically re-recruiting your entire roster, right? I spent hours and hours watching every game. I probably watched every one of the games from the 2025 K-State football season three times trying to put faces with names and numbers. It's so much more difficult when you don't have a background with a young man. So that was part of the homework process. Before you make all those phone calls, you got to figure out who the heck is who. That part has been a whirlwind. Obviously, we've been traveling around the country and trying to meet with as many players as we possibly can because there are a lot of pieces we'd love to have stick around.
At the same time, we were working toward evaluating and the transfer portal. We want guys who want to be here and have a love and a passion for what we're doing and that see our vision and are bought into our vision. If they're not, good luck to them, and we're going to recruit our butt off to make sure we put ourselves into the best position possible.
FRITCHEN: You see reports of Iowa State having very few players on its roster. How scary is that in this day in age?
PETERSON: I think it is what it is. It's just what this world has evolved into, and the faster you embrace that and not feel sorry for yourself, the faster you're able to get things accomplished. Whether it's a new staff, you see teams all across the country, and they didn't have staff turnover, and they're still getting demolished by the transfer portal. Because of that, it's just accept reality and go attack it head on. As soon as you do that, you're able to better-position yourself to take the emotion out of things a little bit and go, "This is where we're deficient, these are our positions of need, and this is where we need experienced guys." We just roll.
FRITCHEN: This marks the first time in your coaching career that you have been designated with the "Defensive Coordinator" title at a Power 4 school. What's the sense of excitement and achievement in being selected to serve that role and all that goes along with it?
PETERSON: Honor. It's an honor and a privilege to be the leader of the defense and to serve these young men and this staff. You build relationships but you do it with a servant mentality. We're here to help other people, whether that's on or off the field. Honestly, coming here to a very football rich-tradition school is a bigger honor. My wife is driving up here today with our three little girls, so they're all fired up. It is truly an honor. Going back, Bill Snyder and everything he built from a foundational standpoint, and I've experienced it plenty first-hand as a competitor against those guys, and I couldn't be more fired up about being here.
FRITCHEN: We might be going blast from the past, but when you hear "Kansas State defense" what comes to mind?
PETERSON: Grit. Relentless effort. Tenacity. Violence. Those are the things I think this place has been established on, and I think the hard part about the transfer portal is you have to find the right fit, because you play harder when you love each other, and you play harder when you're invested in one another and you put blood, sweat and tears into a common goal. So those are all things that have to show up. It's our job to put the right guys in the locker room that can make that happen. Those are the things that first come to mind, and hopefully we're able to put that on tape this fall.
FRITCHEN: Can you detail the past nine days or so, when you arrived in Manhattan, the first orders of business after you joined the staff, and the steps being taken as it pertains to securing this current roster while also identifying pieces outside of the program that might greatly impact K-State's defensive success in 2026?
PETERSON: A couple days before Christmas, on the 21st or 22nd, a few of us got on the plane, and saw as many guys as we could. Weather stopped us from getting to as many places as we wanted to. So, for two days – in 36 hours – we were in seven states seeing as many guys as we could. We landed 9:30 p.m. on December 23. Christmas Eve, I was at my in-laws house in Katy, Texas, outside of Houston, and I Zoomed with three of our current players to show some tape and continue to bridge the gap. Woke up Christmas morning with the kiddos, did that, and after that it was right back into it. I didn't want to bother guys when they were with their families on Christmas day. I started hopping on calls and Zooms again on the 26th, and I then took the nine-and-a-half-hour drive and hit the ground running and started evaluating more guys. I just got back from another 36-hour journey, as a couple of us went all over the country to see our current players. We got in late last night, and we're here this morning to meet everybody who weren't here when I got here two or three weeks ago.
The fortunate thing is, defensively, we have a really, really good group of guys who've been interconnected in some way or form, and there's a lot of trust and a lot of relational equity built up over the course of years. (New linebackers coach) Nick Toth and I, he was an outside linebacker coach at A&M when I was a GA for the 2011 season. He was a defensive coordinator for us at Fresno State when I was there. I'm actually his youngest daughter's Godfather. From a trust standpoint, him and I have known each other for years. (New co-defensive coordinator) Marcus Woodson, we were together at Fresno State, and I got to see his career blossom from Fresno State to Memphis to Auburn to Florida State to Arkansas to K-State. We kept in contact with one another.
From the alignment standpoint of what we're about, and how we coach our players, obviously, there's a standard at which things are coached, and there are non-negotiables that are associated with that. We are teachers, and the faster we can teach our players what we want to get accomplished and why, the faster they take ownership of the defense and of each other and you get peer-to-peer feedback, not just all of us barking. Which, that's going to happen, but it always means more coming from a peer. That's our job to empower these young men to do that.
FRITCHEN: No matter what the roster looks like, from the get-go, things like standards and mentality and attitude must exist. What will be the standards, mentality and attitude of your defenses at K-State? Ideally, what would you like the identity of your defense to be?
PETERSON: Well, if you want to be the MOB, you'd better come with the MOB mentality. What that means is this: There are fewer and fewer young men these days that really know what it is like to strain, whether that's straining in pursuit, straining to fight and shed blocks, whether that's straining for leverage, and not taking the easy way out. Defensive football is all about leverage. When you talk about what it really means to strain, that's our first priority. These young men will understand what it really means to strain their bodies. Number two, you play with one heartbeat. Everybody being on the same page and them being able to look to their right and left and trust that they're all invested at the same level because you're willing to go the extra mile when you're truly invested in one another, like we talked about earlier.
We are going to play fast, physical, violent freaking football. That's what it's going to be. The way we're designed is we're going to be very multiple from a coverage systems standpoint but simplify it in a package to where it's not complex to our guys. The quarterbacks and wide receivers these days grew up since they were four years old attacking certain coverages. So, they have the answers. We have to make it very difficult on offenses to identify what coverages we're in from a coverage standpoint and from a mixing-concepts standpoint, and that's what you're going to see.
FRITCHEN: Do you prefer a four-man defensive front or a three-man defensive front?
PETERSON: We're primarily a four-down front. Obviously, we'll mix in some three-down stuff, and some looks for the offense to create some multiplicity up front in the blocking schemes and changing the targets for the offensive line and protection concepts. When you're always one thing, you become predictable, and it's easier for — to me, it's all about the players. You always have to adapt your scheme to a certain extent to what the skillset of what your individual team is for that year. That's still yet to be determined. There are obviously certain things that are guaranteed to be in there, but we have to be able to adapt as we go based upon how we're able to build this roster. That's where sometimes coaches mess it up, is that they try to use a guy in a spot where that's not really what his skillset is, and it is what it is. You have who you have on the roster, so you better make the best of it, and you better put those guys into places to be successful. It's our job to put those pieces together to make sure we're putting our guys at a schematic advantage based upon their individual skillsets.
FRITCHEN: We've talked a lot about the roster so far. Do you have an idea how many defensive players you have returning and how many you need?
PETERSON: It's always a moving target. You don't know for certain where guys' heads are completely at. We're trying to do everything we possibly can to bridge the gap. It's a moving target. I promise you this, we're going to be prepared for whatever that looks like, and we're going to do everything we can to keep the roster together, and how many guys we need to take we're going to go get them. If there's one thing, I've looked the guys in the eyes when I've told them this, if there's one thing I feel very confident about is we're going to find the guys we need to be successful. We hope they're a part of it, and if they're not, good luck to them, and we're going to be successful without them. Again, it goes back to we want guys who are invested in this place and in this staff and that are going to put their best foot forward every single day, be the best version of themselves for each other, and for themselves.
FRITCHEN: What qualities stuck out the first time you met Collin Klein?
PETERSON: Leadership. He's got this humble, quiet confidence about him. He's kind of a been-there-done-that and is definitely himself on a day-to-day basis. He's very organized, smart as heck, and a great human being, which I think, as you really dive into the moving parts of this profession, whether it's staffing and transfer portal, being real and genuine is so crucial these days, whether that's long-term roster retention, whether it's relationships with the community, connecting with alumni and boosters and former players, just being a genuine self on a day-to-day basis creates stability. That's who Collin Klein is in his core. He's the same human being every day. You know what you're going to get from him every single day, which allows the staff to be aligned, and it trickles down throughout the organization, and to the players. Anybody who touches the organization will see a consistent human every single day that demands excellence.
With this day in age and the way college football is, when you're able to look at parents in the eyes and young men in the eyes and say, "Look, this is home for our head coach. He has put his blood, sweat and tears onto the field, and he's had tremendous success as a Heisman Trophy finalist." It's a different level of buy-in and approach that people that weren't necessarily initially as invested buy into in a hurry. Especially with the transfer portal, he has a lot of familiarity with the people. There's less of a learning curve to build the staff around to get everybody understanding what the priorities are and what it's about. Those things are a lot more simple because of the experience level here and the people.
FRITCHEN: For as much positive attention that Collin received in guiding the high-powered offensive attack at Texas A&M, the defense was plenty stellar in helping the Aggies to an 11-2 record and a spot in the College Football Playoff — first in the country in third down defense, second in sacks, third in tackles for loss, 16th in passing yards allowed, 19th in total defense, and 22nd in fourth down defense. In this day in age, what are the keys to building a strong defense?
PETERSON: Teaching. It goes back to the mindset of how you play the game, the violence of which it's played at, the tenacity at which it's played at, the strain level that it takes, but it's teaching concepts, and simplifying the game for our side of the ball while making it very difficult for the offense to digest. It's not about confusing the offensive coordinator on the opposing team, it's about confusing the quarterback and the players. The headset communication has changed things a little bit, but at the end of the day, when the ball is snapped, we have to make it a moving target for that quarterback and those offensive linemen when it comes to their targets and the run game and how they're set in their protections. It's multiplicity for the offense but simplification for us on defense. Ultimately, I was fortunate because I was a graduate assistant under Mike Sherman, who was a teacher by trade, and he developed in me the necessity of what it takes to be a great teacher. It's our job to teach these young men the concepts and try to get them a PhD in football. Again, it's not about what we know as a staff, but about what our guys can process and how fast they can play. We're going to find great players who want to play at K-State. What we can't do is slow them down and make them robotic because we're either trying to do too much or we're not good enough teachers of the game to get them to play fast, physical and violent.
FRITCHEN: To back up, from Fresno State to New Mexico to Kansas and to Texas A&M, how have those stops helped prepare you for this spot in your coaching journey?
PETERSON: If you're good at anything, or want to be great at anything, you're constantly learning along the way. Within those years, I've been very, very open to the different coverage concepts and front structures, and it's allowed me to have experience whether it's a 3-4 or a 3-3-5 or a 4-2-5 or a 4-3. I've been involved in all of those every bit of the way, and it's like, "OK, I love this about this place from a schematic standpoint." With an eye on wanting to become a defensive coordinator and packaging it in the way you want you're able to build it over the course of time in a way that it all marries. I've been very fortunate working for head coaches — guys who've had some really solid careers and a lot of success, and each one of them has their strengths and weaknesses, and you find ways to learn and take things from them, whether that's dealing with staffing, handling an organization or schematics. When you stop learning or think you have all the answers, that's when you should probably get out of the profession because you're going to get outworked and somebody is going to pass you up. When you become stagnant, you're going to be passed by. All those stops and all those guys I've been around have really set the tone for me to be able to take this next step.
FRITCHEN: You're a Texas A&M alum who worked at KU and you're now wearing the Powercat at K-State. How does that feel?
PETERSON: It's awesome.
FRITCHEN: Why?
PETERSON: It's awesome. You always see it from the outside, but I've always had a tremendous respect for this place and what it represents, and then the people, obviously, I know who Collin Klein is, and I know what he says about the community, support and how special this place is. If there's one person in this profession that I trust with every ounce of my being, it's Collin Klein. I get fired up. Let's go.
FRITCHEN: Final question. From the days of growing up in your hometown in Lexington, Texas, to where you are today, as a person, what have you learned most about yourself during your journey?
PETERSON: I owe a lot to the people I've been around, starting with my wife, who is obviously along this journey, and she's been the bedrock of our family with three little girls, and that can be really hard on families, but the support system we have with our families, whether it's my parents, my brother and his wife, and my nephew, and my wife's family, they are fully bought into what we do, and our lifestyle that is coaching. It's just a whole level of appreciation. We've been surrounded by a village of people who love us and support us unconditionally. From an appreciation standpoint, you always have to take a step back and go, "This is freaking awesome." We've been just very, very fortunate with the people we've been around staring with our families and the coaches, and I couldn't be more appreciative of the journey along the way.
He's a Texas A&M alum who faced the purple and white as a player and then as a member of the coaching staff, and later he served as defensive coach for four years at Kansas, but today, after a 36-hour whirlwind trip to see current Kansas State players, Jordan Peterson wears a purple quarter-zip with a silver Powercat and a gray cap that reads "CATS" as he sits at a table by Bill Snyder Family Stadum.
"It's awesome," Peterson says.
He smiles.
"Collin Klein is undefeated against me, so if I can't beat him, I have to join him," Peterson says. "So, here we go."
Klein named Peterson as K-State's new defensive coordinator after spending two seasons with Peterson on staff at Texas A&M, where Klein served as offensive coordinator, and Peterson served as co-defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach.
A native of Lexington, Texas, Peterson has five years of coordinator experience and has spent six years on Big 12 staffs, having served as a graduate assistant at Texas A&M in 2010 and 2011 — the Aggies' final two years in the conference — in addition to being a defensive assistant at Kansas between 2020 and 2023.
"We had some run-ins with the K-State Wildcats, first as a coach and a player," Peterson says, chuckling. "It's good to be on this side of things. I played at A&M and ran into playing K-State in 2005-09, and then I severed as a GA in 2010-11, so I was there for the four-overtime game with Collin. Then, obviously, I was at the other school in Kansas for four years."
Peterson's journey as a position coach began at Fresno State, first as a defensive secondary coach in 2012-14 and then as outside linebackers coach and recruiting coordinator in 2015-16. He coached safeties and served as defensive passing game coordinator and the defensive coordinator at New Mexico between 2017-2019, then reached the Power 4 level at Kansas. In 2020, he coached safeties. In 2021, he was senior defensive analyst. In 2022, he coached defensive backs. In 2023, he served as defensive backs coach and defensive passing game coordinator.
After four years at Kansas, Peterson moved to Texas A&M, where his defenses were at another level and got better. This past season, the Aggies ranked first in the country in third down defense, second in sacks, third in tackles for loss, 16th in passing yards allowed, 19th in total defense, and 22nd in fourth down defense.
And now Peterson is with Klein. In Manhattan. Wearing purple. And he's on a mission.
"If you want to be the MOB, you'd better come with the MOB mentality," Peterson says. "We are going to play fast, physical, violent freaking football. That's what it's going to be."
Peterson spoke with K-State Sports Extra's D. Scott Fritchen about his journey to K-State, defensive schematics, styles, rosters, and, of course, the Wildcats' four-overtime win over the Aggies on November 12, 2011 at Bill Snyder Family Stadium:
JORDAN PETERSON: We had some run-ins with the K-State Wildcats, first as a coach and a player. It's good to be on this side of things. I played at A&M and ran into playing K-State in 2005-09, and then I severed as a GA in 2010-11 so I was there for the four-overtime game with Collin. Then, obviously, I was at the other school in Kansas for four years. Collin Klein is undefeated against me, so if I can't beat him, I have to join him. So, here we go.
D. SCOTT FRITCHEN: So, since we're on topic, take me back to K-State's 53-30 win over Texas A&M in four overtimes on November 12, 2011, at Bill Snyder Family Stadium. Collin Klein plowed his way into the end zone for the game-winning touchdown, his sixth touchdown in the longest game in Big 12 history. An amazing game.
PETERSON: I was on the sideline as a GA, and the things that stick out in my mind is obviously the grit of that game. It was a battle on both sides. From the secondary standpoint, we got beat on our quarters and were playing cover-4, so we joke about that all the time. As a coach and a player, you remember the negative things, so Collin says, "Yeah, I threw a corner route on a cover-3 and luckily I sold it, and it didn't hurt us." So, he's remembering the negative things he did, and I'm remembering the negative things on our side. That was a heck of a game. Heck of a game.
FRITCHEN: Now we're here. Things move fast this day in age in college football these days.
PETERSON: Yes, pretty fast.
FRITCHEN: On December 20, you bid farewell to a two-year stint a co-defensive coordinator and defensive backs coach at your alma mater, Texas A&M, and the very next day you are announced as the new defensive coordinator at Kansas State. Can you walk me through the days building up to Texas A&M's playoff game and then the day after the game and exactly how everything transpired?
PETERSON: Obviously, Coach Klein and I have a really good relationship. I feel very confident in who he is, what he's about, the priorities he's set, and the foundation in which he builds everything, and he builds everything on relationships. So, in the two years that we were at Texas A&M, our families got really close, so there were a lot of things aligned in not just from the football side of things but from the personal side of things.
Leading up to the College Football Playoff, we wanted to focus as much as we could on the game against Miami knowing this was coming. We didn't want to make any kind of announcement because of the timing and distractions and what not, but we also knew we needed to get boots on the ground and get rolling. We talked about this roster, where we have to insert pieces to address deficiencies or a lack of depth, so the day after the game, we met as a staff at A&M and it was like, "OK, I'm going here, here and here," and hit the ground running. We made phone calls to our K-State current roster as fast as we possibly could, and got on Zooms, and attacked this thing. You're trying to do two things at the same time. You're trying to meet and build the trust factor within the current roster and at the same time talk about the vision of what this defense is going to be moving forward.
This day in age with the transfer portal, you're basically re-recruiting your entire roster, right? I spent hours and hours watching every game. I probably watched every one of the games from the 2025 K-State football season three times trying to put faces with names and numbers. It's so much more difficult when you don't have a background with a young man. So that was part of the homework process. Before you make all those phone calls, you got to figure out who the heck is who. That part has been a whirlwind. Obviously, we've been traveling around the country and trying to meet with as many players as we possibly can because there are a lot of pieces we'd love to have stick around.
At the same time, we were working toward evaluating and the transfer portal. We want guys who want to be here and have a love and a passion for what we're doing and that see our vision and are bought into our vision. If they're not, good luck to them, and we're going to recruit our butt off to make sure we put ourselves into the best position possible.
FRITCHEN: You see reports of Iowa State having very few players on its roster. How scary is that in this day in age?
PETERSON: I think it is what it is. It's just what this world has evolved into, and the faster you embrace that and not feel sorry for yourself, the faster you're able to get things accomplished. Whether it's a new staff, you see teams all across the country, and they didn't have staff turnover, and they're still getting demolished by the transfer portal. Because of that, it's just accept reality and go attack it head on. As soon as you do that, you're able to better-position yourself to take the emotion out of things a little bit and go, "This is where we're deficient, these are our positions of need, and this is where we need experienced guys." We just roll.
FRITCHEN: This marks the first time in your coaching career that you have been designated with the "Defensive Coordinator" title at a Power 4 school. What's the sense of excitement and achievement in being selected to serve that role and all that goes along with it?
PETERSON: Honor. It's an honor and a privilege to be the leader of the defense and to serve these young men and this staff. You build relationships but you do it with a servant mentality. We're here to help other people, whether that's on or off the field. Honestly, coming here to a very football rich-tradition school is a bigger honor. My wife is driving up here today with our three little girls, so they're all fired up. It is truly an honor. Going back, Bill Snyder and everything he built from a foundational standpoint, and I've experienced it plenty first-hand as a competitor against those guys, and I couldn't be more fired up about being here.
FRITCHEN: We might be going blast from the past, but when you hear "Kansas State defense" what comes to mind?
PETERSON: Grit. Relentless effort. Tenacity. Violence. Those are the things I think this place has been established on, and I think the hard part about the transfer portal is you have to find the right fit, because you play harder when you love each other, and you play harder when you're invested in one another and you put blood, sweat and tears into a common goal. So those are all things that have to show up. It's our job to put the right guys in the locker room that can make that happen. Those are the things that first come to mind, and hopefully we're able to put that on tape this fall.
FRITCHEN: Can you detail the past nine days or so, when you arrived in Manhattan, the first orders of business after you joined the staff, and the steps being taken as it pertains to securing this current roster while also identifying pieces outside of the program that might greatly impact K-State's defensive success in 2026?
PETERSON: A couple days before Christmas, on the 21st or 22nd, a few of us got on the plane, and saw as many guys as we could. Weather stopped us from getting to as many places as we wanted to. So, for two days – in 36 hours – we were in seven states seeing as many guys as we could. We landed 9:30 p.m. on December 23. Christmas Eve, I was at my in-laws house in Katy, Texas, outside of Houston, and I Zoomed with three of our current players to show some tape and continue to bridge the gap. Woke up Christmas morning with the kiddos, did that, and after that it was right back into it. I didn't want to bother guys when they were with their families on Christmas day. I started hopping on calls and Zooms again on the 26th, and I then took the nine-and-a-half-hour drive and hit the ground running and started evaluating more guys. I just got back from another 36-hour journey, as a couple of us went all over the country to see our current players. We got in late last night, and we're here this morning to meet everybody who weren't here when I got here two or three weeks ago.
The fortunate thing is, defensively, we have a really, really good group of guys who've been interconnected in some way or form, and there's a lot of trust and a lot of relational equity built up over the course of years. (New linebackers coach) Nick Toth and I, he was an outside linebacker coach at A&M when I was a GA for the 2011 season. He was a defensive coordinator for us at Fresno State when I was there. I'm actually his youngest daughter's Godfather. From a trust standpoint, him and I have known each other for years. (New co-defensive coordinator) Marcus Woodson, we were together at Fresno State, and I got to see his career blossom from Fresno State to Memphis to Auburn to Florida State to Arkansas to K-State. We kept in contact with one another.
From the alignment standpoint of what we're about, and how we coach our players, obviously, there's a standard at which things are coached, and there are non-negotiables that are associated with that. We are teachers, and the faster we can teach our players what we want to get accomplished and why, the faster they take ownership of the defense and of each other and you get peer-to-peer feedback, not just all of us barking. Which, that's going to happen, but it always means more coming from a peer. That's our job to empower these young men to do that.
FRITCHEN: No matter what the roster looks like, from the get-go, things like standards and mentality and attitude must exist. What will be the standards, mentality and attitude of your defenses at K-State? Ideally, what would you like the identity of your defense to be?
PETERSON: Well, if you want to be the MOB, you'd better come with the MOB mentality. What that means is this: There are fewer and fewer young men these days that really know what it is like to strain, whether that's straining in pursuit, straining to fight and shed blocks, whether that's straining for leverage, and not taking the easy way out. Defensive football is all about leverage. When you talk about what it really means to strain, that's our first priority. These young men will understand what it really means to strain their bodies. Number two, you play with one heartbeat. Everybody being on the same page and them being able to look to their right and left and trust that they're all invested at the same level because you're willing to go the extra mile when you're truly invested in one another, like we talked about earlier.
We are going to play fast, physical, violent freaking football. That's what it's going to be. The way we're designed is we're going to be very multiple from a coverage systems standpoint but simplify it in a package to where it's not complex to our guys. The quarterbacks and wide receivers these days grew up since they were four years old attacking certain coverages. So, they have the answers. We have to make it very difficult on offenses to identify what coverages we're in from a coverage standpoint and from a mixing-concepts standpoint, and that's what you're going to see.
FRITCHEN: Do you prefer a four-man defensive front or a three-man defensive front?
PETERSON: We're primarily a four-down front. Obviously, we'll mix in some three-down stuff, and some looks for the offense to create some multiplicity up front in the blocking schemes and changing the targets for the offensive line and protection concepts. When you're always one thing, you become predictable, and it's easier for — to me, it's all about the players. You always have to adapt your scheme to a certain extent to what the skillset of what your individual team is for that year. That's still yet to be determined. There are obviously certain things that are guaranteed to be in there, but we have to be able to adapt as we go based upon how we're able to build this roster. That's where sometimes coaches mess it up, is that they try to use a guy in a spot where that's not really what his skillset is, and it is what it is. You have who you have on the roster, so you better make the best of it, and you better put those guys into places to be successful. It's our job to put those pieces together to make sure we're putting our guys at a schematic advantage based upon their individual skillsets.
FRITCHEN: We've talked a lot about the roster so far. Do you have an idea how many defensive players you have returning and how many you need?
PETERSON: It's always a moving target. You don't know for certain where guys' heads are completely at. We're trying to do everything we possibly can to bridge the gap. It's a moving target. I promise you this, we're going to be prepared for whatever that looks like, and we're going to do everything we can to keep the roster together, and how many guys we need to take we're going to go get them. If there's one thing, I've looked the guys in the eyes when I've told them this, if there's one thing I feel very confident about is we're going to find the guys we need to be successful. We hope they're a part of it, and if they're not, good luck to them, and we're going to be successful without them. Again, it goes back to we want guys who are invested in this place and in this staff and that are going to put their best foot forward every single day, be the best version of themselves for each other, and for themselves.
FRITCHEN: What qualities stuck out the first time you met Collin Klein?
PETERSON: Leadership. He's got this humble, quiet confidence about him. He's kind of a been-there-done-that and is definitely himself on a day-to-day basis. He's very organized, smart as heck, and a great human being, which I think, as you really dive into the moving parts of this profession, whether it's staffing and transfer portal, being real and genuine is so crucial these days, whether that's long-term roster retention, whether it's relationships with the community, connecting with alumni and boosters and former players, just being a genuine self on a day-to-day basis creates stability. That's who Collin Klein is in his core. He's the same human being every day. You know what you're going to get from him every single day, which allows the staff to be aligned, and it trickles down throughout the organization, and to the players. Anybody who touches the organization will see a consistent human every single day that demands excellence.
With this day in age and the way college football is, when you're able to look at parents in the eyes and young men in the eyes and say, "Look, this is home for our head coach. He has put his blood, sweat and tears onto the field, and he's had tremendous success as a Heisman Trophy finalist." It's a different level of buy-in and approach that people that weren't necessarily initially as invested buy into in a hurry. Especially with the transfer portal, he has a lot of familiarity with the people. There's less of a learning curve to build the staff around to get everybody understanding what the priorities are and what it's about. Those things are a lot more simple because of the experience level here and the people.
FRITCHEN: For as much positive attention that Collin received in guiding the high-powered offensive attack at Texas A&M, the defense was plenty stellar in helping the Aggies to an 11-2 record and a spot in the College Football Playoff — first in the country in third down defense, second in sacks, third in tackles for loss, 16th in passing yards allowed, 19th in total defense, and 22nd in fourth down defense. In this day in age, what are the keys to building a strong defense?
PETERSON: Teaching. It goes back to the mindset of how you play the game, the violence of which it's played at, the tenacity at which it's played at, the strain level that it takes, but it's teaching concepts, and simplifying the game for our side of the ball while making it very difficult for the offense to digest. It's not about confusing the offensive coordinator on the opposing team, it's about confusing the quarterback and the players. The headset communication has changed things a little bit, but at the end of the day, when the ball is snapped, we have to make it a moving target for that quarterback and those offensive linemen when it comes to their targets and the run game and how they're set in their protections. It's multiplicity for the offense but simplification for us on defense. Ultimately, I was fortunate because I was a graduate assistant under Mike Sherman, who was a teacher by trade, and he developed in me the necessity of what it takes to be a great teacher. It's our job to teach these young men the concepts and try to get them a PhD in football. Again, it's not about what we know as a staff, but about what our guys can process and how fast they can play. We're going to find great players who want to play at K-State. What we can't do is slow them down and make them robotic because we're either trying to do too much or we're not good enough teachers of the game to get them to play fast, physical and violent.
FRITCHEN: To back up, from Fresno State to New Mexico to Kansas and to Texas A&M, how have those stops helped prepare you for this spot in your coaching journey?
PETERSON: If you're good at anything, or want to be great at anything, you're constantly learning along the way. Within those years, I've been very, very open to the different coverage concepts and front structures, and it's allowed me to have experience whether it's a 3-4 or a 3-3-5 or a 4-2-5 or a 4-3. I've been involved in all of those every bit of the way, and it's like, "OK, I love this about this place from a schematic standpoint." With an eye on wanting to become a defensive coordinator and packaging it in the way you want you're able to build it over the course of time in a way that it all marries. I've been very fortunate working for head coaches — guys who've had some really solid careers and a lot of success, and each one of them has their strengths and weaknesses, and you find ways to learn and take things from them, whether that's dealing with staffing, handling an organization or schematics. When you stop learning or think you have all the answers, that's when you should probably get out of the profession because you're going to get outworked and somebody is going to pass you up. When you become stagnant, you're going to be passed by. All those stops and all those guys I've been around have really set the tone for me to be able to take this next step.
FRITCHEN: You're a Texas A&M alum who worked at KU and you're now wearing the Powercat at K-State. How does that feel?
PETERSON: It's awesome.
FRITCHEN: Why?
PETERSON: It's awesome. You always see it from the outside, but I've always had a tremendous respect for this place and what it represents, and then the people, obviously, I know who Collin Klein is, and I know what he says about the community, support and how special this place is. If there's one person in this profession that I trust with every ounce of my being, it's Collin Klein. I get fired up. Let's go.
FRITCHEN: Final question. From the days of growing up in your hometown in Lexington, Texas, to where you are today, as a person, what have you learned most about yourself during your journey?
PETERSON: I owe a lot to the people I've been around, starting with my wife, who is obviously along this journey, and she's been the bedrock of our family with three little girls, and that can be really hard on families, but the support system we have with our families, whether it's my parents, my brother and his wife, and my nephew, and my wife's family, they are fully bought into what we do, and our lifestyle that is coaching. It's just a whole level of appreciation. We've been surrounded by a village of people who love us and support us unconditionally. From an appreciation standpoint, you always have to take a step back and go, "This is freaking awesome." We've been just very, very fortunate with the people we've been around staring with our families and the coaches, and I couldn't be more appreciative of the journey along the way.
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