By Ernie Gonzalez — Football Beat Writer
On the same day San Jose State football is introducing a fresh batch of players for its National Early Signing Day, it also loses linebacker coach Bojay Filimoeatu.
Utah State head coach Gary Anderson announced Wednesday morning that Filimoeatu accepted the outside linebackers coaching position.
Filimoeatu played college ball as an Aggie after attending Utah’s Granger High School.
He graduated in 2012 with a degree in Interdisciplinary Studies and was picked up by the Oakland Raiders in 2014 after a knee injury put his career on hold.
After being tossed around practice squads in the NFL, he took 2015 off and began his coaching career in 2016 at Oregon State with head coach Brent Brennan.
Filimoeatu followed Brennan to SJSU, where he coached star linebacker Frank Ginda, who became the second Spartan linebacker ever to receive first-team all Mountain West honors in 2017.
That same season, Ginda broke the Mountain West’s all-time single season tackles record with 173 in just 12 games.
In 2018, Filimoeatu coached junior linebacker Ethan Aguayo, who in week 12, had 20 tackles against Nevada, the best single-game tackle total for a defensive player in the Mountain West all season.
Filimoeatu, who grew up in Utah, recently had a baby boy (Johnny) earlier in 2018 and is probably making a family decision. His wife, Hailey, set softball records at USU and for both of them to be heading back to Logan was probably an easy decision at heart.
As for the Aggies program, which is arguably coming off its best offensive season ever, it’ll turn to Filimoeatu to perfect the middle of the defense.
Utah State is four days removed from a 52-13 smashing over North Texas in the New Mexico Bowl and will certainly be a contending team in the Mountain West for several years.
Meanwhile, for San Jose State, the search for a linebacker guru is underway.
Follow Ernie on Twitter @superego1012