Western Kentucky’s football team is once more in the market for an offensive coordinator.

UTSA announced Monday the hiring of Rick Bowie as that program’s offensive coordinator. Bowie spent one season leading the offense at WKU, helping the Hilltoppers to a 9-4 overall recorded capped off by a 27-16 win against Southern Miss in the New Orleans Bowl on Dec. 23.

Bowie’s departure means the Tops will have a new offensive coordinator for the seventh time in head coach Tyson Helton’s tenure leading the program – Bryan Ellis spent two seasons in the role (2019-20) and another as co-offensive coordinator to Zach Kittley (2021), then Ben Arbuckle, Josh Crawford and Zack Lankford all shared co-OC duties in 2022, followed by Drew Hollingshead in 2023, Will Friend in 2024 (with Hollingshead as co-OC) and Bowie this past season. Helton will be entering his eighth season leading the program in 2026.

Bowie, who arrived at WKU after serving as the offensive coordinator at FCS-level Abilene Christian, directed a Hilltopper offense that averaged more than 400 yards of total offense per game and led Conference USA in passing yards per contest (272.2 yards per game) – that also ranked in the top 20 nationally.

Graduate senior quarterback Maverick McIvor followed Bowie from Abilene Christian and began the season as the starter, completing 183 of 273 passes for 2,062 yards and 12 touchdowns. McIvor battled injuries midway through the season and never regained the starting spot as redshirt freshman Rodney Tisdale Jr. locked down the QB1 job with solid play the rest of the season. Tisdale passed for 1,432 yards and nine touchdowns on 139 completions. He also ran for 108 yards and a pair of touchdowns. Tisdale was named the CUSA Freshman of the Year.

Several of Bowie’s players on offense garnered postseason recognition. Offensive lineman Laurence Seymore earn Phil Steeel Second Team All-American honors, as well as Football Writers Association of America Second Team All-American and All-CUSA Second Team accolades.

Wide receiver Matthew Henry also landed on the All-CUSA second team, while Tisdale, running back Marvis Parrish and offensive lineman Elijah Williams were CUSA All-Freshman Team honorees.

Bowie is the latest member of Helton’s 2025 staff to move on to another program. Co-defensive coordinator Da’Von Brown was named defensive backs coach at California last month, while defensive tackles coach Kali James, director of player personnel Jarae Thurmond and assistant head coach/director of recruiting Nick Lamattina have also reportedly accepted jobs elsewhere – James to James Madison according to his X (formerly Twitter account), Thurmond to North Texas as assistant general manager/director of scouting (also listed on his X account), while Lamattina was announced as Cincinnati’s director of player personnel last month.

WKU may have its next offensive coordinator lined up for the 2026 season. Multiple reports have named former Middle Tennessee offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Bodie Reeder to the same role at at WKU – Reeder’s X profile lists him as the Hilltoppers’ offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach, although WKU has yet to make any announcements of the 2026 football staff.

Reeder, a native of Mahomet, Illinois, spent the past two seasons leading the Blue Raiders’ offense under head coach Derek Mason. Reeder’s MTSU offense ranked eighth in CUSA with 371.6 yards per game, but was the league’s fourth-best passing attack with 266.1 passing yards per contest.

NITTA COMMITS TO OKLAHOMA

WKU currently has multiple players off this past season’s roster in the NCAA transfer portal with potentially more to come before the portal closes on Jan. 16.

Hilltopper offensive lineman Caleb Nitta announced his next destination on Monday, committing to Oklahoma. Nitta is a Leesburg, Virginia, native who played one season at WKU after transferring from Virginia Tech where he began as a walk-on. Nitta provided depth in the early part of this past season for the Tops before moving into a starting role at center. Nitta started nine games for the Tops as a redshirt sophomore.

Cornerback Dylan Flowers, a redshirt senior from Play Del Rey, California, who spent this past season with the Hilltoppers after transferring from College of the Canyons – he also previously play at Southern Utah and BYU – earlier announced his commitment to Duke.

Flowers tallied 33 tackles, four pass breakups, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery for the Tops.