Ron Vanderlinden is a retired American

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

coach. Vanderlinden was most recently the

linebackers coach In American football, a position coach is a team official in charge of coaching a specific position group. Position coaches have more specialized duties than the head coach, assistant coach, and the offensive and defensive coordinators. Common ...

Air Force An air force – in the broadest sense – is the national military branch that primarily conducts aerial warfare. More specifically, it is the branch of a nation's armed services that is responsible for aerial warfare as distinct from an a ...

. He served as the head football coach at the

University of Maryland, College Park The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the flagship institution of the University System of Mary ...

from 1997 to 2000. Vanderlinden is known for his recruiting ability on the

East Coast East Coast may refer to: Entertainment * East Coast hip hop, a subgenre of hip hop * East Coast (ASAP Ferg song), "East Coast" (ASAP Ferg song), 2017 * East Coast (Saves the Day song), "East Coast" (Saves the Day song), 2004 * East Coast FM, a ra ...

and within his native state of

Michigan Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes region of the upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the 10th-largest state by population, the 11th-largest by area, and the ...

Early life

A native of

Livonia, Michigan Livonia is a city in Wayne County, Michigan, Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 95,535 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, which ranked it as Michigan's ninth most-populated municipality. Livonia is a part ...

, Vanderlinden is one of seven children born to parents Pete and Mary Vanderlinden. His father was one of 14 children born to

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

immigrants of

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

descent. Vanderlinden played high school football at

Divine Child High School Divine Child High School, commonly known as Divine Child (DC), is a private, Roman Catholic, college-preparatory, parish high school in Dearborn, Michigan, United States. Divine Child is ranked among the top 15 percent of private high schools i ...

Dearborn, Michigan Dearborn is a city in Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. At the 2020 census, it had a population of 109,976. Dearborn is the seventh most-populated city in Michigan and is home to the largest Muslim population in the United States pe ...

, where he was a member of two state championship teams. His high school coach was

Bill McCartney William Paul McCartney (born August 22, 1940) is a former American football player and coach and the founder of the Promise Keepers men's ministry. He was the head coach at the University of Colorado Boulder for thirteen seasons (1982–1994), ...

, who later became the only high school coach ever hired by

University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...

coaching legend

Bo Schembechler Glenn Edward "Bo" Schembechler Jr. ( ; April 1, 1929 – November 17, 2006) was an American football player, coach, and athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at Miami University from 1963 to 1968 and at the University of ...

. Vanderlinden reunited with McCartney as a coach after his playing career ended.

College playing career

In college, Vanderlinden played football as a four-year starting

center Center or centre may refer to: Mathematics *Center (geometry), the middle of an object * Center (algebra), used in various contexts ** Center (group theory) ** Center (ring theory) * Graph center, the set of all vertices of minimum eccentrici ...

NCAA Division III NCAA Division III (D-III) is a division of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) in the United States. D-III consists of athletic programs at colleges and universities that choose not to offer athletic scholarships to their stu ...

Albion College Albion College is a private liberal arts college in Albion, Michigan. The college was founded in 1835 and its undergraduate population was approximately 1,500 students in 2014. They participate in NCAA Division III and the Michigan Intercolle ...

and twice earned All-MIAA conference honors. He was part of the 1976 Albion Britons football team that achieved a perfect 9–0 record. Both the 1976 and 1977 teams have since been inducted into the Albion College Hall of Fame.

Early coaching career

In 1978, he started his career as a graduate assistant at

Bowling Green A bowling green is a finely laid, close-mown and rolled stretch of turf for playing the game of bowls. Before 1830, when Edwin Beard Budding of Thrupp, near Stroud, UK, invented the lawnmower, lawns were often kept cropped by grazing sheep on ...

under

Denny Stolz Dennis Earl Stolz (born September 12, 1934) is a former American football player and coach. He served as the head coach at Alma College (1965–1970), Michigan State University (1973–1975), Bowling Green State University (1977–1985), and San ...

and also coached as a graduate assistant at

under

. His first full-time coaching position was with Ball State, where he served under head coach

Dwight Wallace Dwight Wallace (born December 26, 1943) is a former American football player, coach, and college athletics administrator. He served as the head football coach at the Ball State University Ball State University (Ball State, State or BSU) is a ...

for two seasons. From 1983 to 1991, Vanderlinden was a defensive line coach at

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

under head coach

, reuniting him with his high school football head coach. McCartney had also been an assistant at Michigan with Vanderlinden. During their time in

Boulder In geology, a boulder (or rarely bowlder) is a rock fragment with size greater than in diameter. Smaller pieces are called cobbles and pebbles. While a boulder may be small enough to move or roll manually, others are extremely massive. In c ...

, Colorado won the 1990 National Championship. From 1992 to 1996, Vanderlinden served as assistant head coach and

defensive coordinator A defensive coordinator is a coach responsible for a gridiron football (American football) team's defense. Generally, the defensive coordinator, the offensive coordinator and the special teams coordinator represent the second level of a team's c ...

at Northwestern. There he played a part in the reversal of fortunes of a struggling football program into a two-time

Big Ten The Big Ten Conference (stylized B1G, formerly the Western Conference and the Big Nine Conference) is the oldest Division I collegiate athletic conference in the United States. Founded as the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representati ...

champion.Ron Vanderlinden Profile
Penn State University Official Athletic Site, retrieved January 15, 2009. Under his guidance, linebacker

Pat Fitzgerald Patrick William Fitzgerald Jr. (born December 2, 1974) is the current head coach of the Northwestern University Wildcats football team. He was selected after the unexpected death of Randy Walker and announced at a press conference on July 7, 2 ...

was named the 1995 and '96 Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year, a two-time All-American, and as the winner of the

Bednarik Award The Chuck Bednarik Award is presented annually to the defensive player in college football as judged by the Maxwell Football Club to be the best in the United States. The award is named for Chuck Bednarik, a former college and professional Americ ...

and

Nagurski Award The Bronko Nagurski Trophy has been awarded annually since 1993 to the collegiate American football defensive player adjudged by the membership of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) to be the best in the National Collegiate Athl ...

Head coach at Maryland

In 1997, Vanderlinden was hired as the head coach of the

Maryland Terrapins The Maryland Terrapins, commonly referred to as the Terps, consist of 19 men's and women's varsity intercollegiate athletic teams that represent the University of Maryland, College Park in National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divis ...

, a team without a bowl game and only one winning season since 1990. In both the 1999 and 2000 seasons, Maryland narrowly missed achieving a winning season and bowl game bid by losing their finale and ended both years with a 5-6 record. Vanderlinden's staff recruited players who would be instrumental in the team's meteoric rise in 2001 to an ACC championship, a

Bowl Championship Series The Bowl Championship Series (BCS) was a selection system that created four or five bowl game match-ups involving eight or ten of the top ranked teams in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of American college football, including ...

game, and a top-ten final ranking. Some of these players included linebacker E.J. Henderson, quarterback

Shaun Hill Shaun Christopher Hill (born January 9, 1980) is a former American football quarterback who played 15 seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He was signed by the Minnesota Vikings as an undrafted free agent in 2002. He played college fo ...

, and wide receiver Guilian Gary. Also during Vanderlinden's tenure, running back

Lamont Jordan LaMont Damon Jordan (born November 11, 1978) is an American football coach and former running back. He was drafted by the New York Jets in the second round of the 2001 NFL Draft. He played college football at Maryland. Jordan also played for the ...

set the school record for single-game rushing with 306 yards. Vanderlinden was fired after the 2000 season, finishing with a 15-29 record overall.

Later coaching career

Vanderlinden joined the

Penn State Nittany Lions football The Penn State Nittany Lions team represents the Pennsylvania State University in college football. The Nittany Lions compete in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision as a member of the Big Ten Conference, which they joined in 1993 afte ...

team in 2001 as linebackers coach under

Joe Paterno Joseph Vincent Paterno (; December 21, 1926 – January 22, 2012), sometimes referred to as JoePa, was an American college football player, athletic director, and coach. He was the head coach of the Penn State Nittany Lions football, Penn ...

, where he oversaw the school's traditional "Linebacker U." He had helped develop a linebacker unit that included All-American 2005

Butkus Butkus is the masculine form of a Lithuanian family name. Its feminine forms are: Butkienė or Butkuvienė (married woman or widow) and Butkutė (unmarried woman). The surname is derived from the diminutive form ''Butkus'' of the Lithuanian given ...

and 2005/2006 Bednarik award winner

Paul Posluszny Paul Michael Posluszny (; born October 10, 1984) is a former American football linebacker who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons, primarily with the Jacksonville Jaguars. He played college football at Penn State Universit ...

, a consensus

All-America The All-America designation is an annual honor bestowed upon an amateur sports person from the United States who is considered to be one of the best amateurs in their sport. Individuals receiving this distinction are typically added to an All-Am ...

n, 2003, All-

linebacker Gino Capone, and 2006

n and 2007 Bednarik Award winner Dan Connor. He has also recruited several prominent players such as

Allen Robinson Allen Bernard Robinson II (born August 24, 1993) is an American football wide receiver for the Los Angeles Rams of the National Football League (NFL). He was drafted by the Jacksonville Jaguars in the second round of the 2014 NFL Draft, and pl ...

Sean Lee Sean Patrick Lee (born July 22, 1986) is a former American football linebacker. He played his entire 11-year professional career with the Dallas Cowboys. He played college football at Penn State, and was selected by the Cowboys in the second r ...

and

Gerald Hodges Gerald Davon Hodges Jr. (born January 17, 1991) is a former American football linebacker. He played college football at Penn State. He was drafted by the Minnesota Vikings in the fourth round, 120th overall, of the 2013 NFL Draft. Early years ...

. On November 10, 2011 Tom Bradley announced that Vanderlinden and

defensive line In gridiron football, a lineman is a player who specializes in play at the line of scrimmage. The linemen of the team currently in possession of the ball are the offensive line, while linemen on the opposing team are the defensive line. A numbe ...

coach Larry Johnson would serve as co-defensive coordinators. In 2012, Vanderlinden was retained as linebackers coach under new coach Bill O'Brien. After parting ways with the Penn State program following the 2013 season, he joined

Troy Calhoun Nathan Troy Calhoun (born September 26, 1966) is an American football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at the United States Air Force Academy, a position he has held since the 2007 season. Early life and playing career Calho ...

's staff at Air Force as linebackers coach, and noted that he had no hard feelings for Penn State nor Bill O'Brien.

Personal

Vanderlinden and his wife, the former Lisa Eckstrom, have one son, Reid, and daughter, Chelsea. Reid is a 2013 graduate of

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private university, private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hem ...

and was a four-year football letterman. He later earned a master's degree at

Penn State #Redirect Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campu ...

. Chelsea is an elementary school teacher.

Head coaching record

College

References

External links

Air Force profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vanderlinden, Ron Living people Year of birth missing (living people) American football centers Air Force Falcons football coaches Albion Britons football players Ball State Cardinals football coaches Colorado Buffaloes football coaches Maryland Terrapins football coaches Michigan Wolverines football coaches Northwestern Wildcats football coaches Penn State Nittany Lions football coaches Sportspeople from Livonia, Michigan Coaches of American football from Michigan Players of American football from Michigan