You could say that Travis Trickett was meant to be a football coach.
His father, Rick, has been highly successful in the business at stops across the board but it wasn’t something he initially wanted for Travis or his brothers.
“He never pressured us into this. He always told us to be doctors and lawyers,” Travis said.
But in high school, Trickett realized that coaching was going to be his route to remaining competitive at the highest level. In fact, he took an active role in assisting while he was still playing.
So, when he approached his father about his desire to follow into the coaching industry, the elder Trickett made it clear that if he was going to get into coaching he had to do it himself. Rick was serving as the offensive line coach at West Virginia under Rich Rodriguez at the time and there was a clear door for Travis to join him.
But it was a door that Travis would have to walk through without him holding it open.
“He said ‘you aren’t riding my coattails. If you want to help coach while you’re a student here, you need to go talk to Coach Rodriguez yourself’,” Trickett recalled.
So, that’s exactly what Trickett did and without his father setting the meeting up he knocked on Rodriguez’s door to let him know he wanted to help him out. That would lead to Trickett spending four years as a student assistant with the Mountaineers, two on each side of the ball.
Trickett found the competition he was looking for through the experience but also realized his love for teaching. Then the longer he remained a coach, realized that the relationships are the true driving factor even when it came to an evolving connection with his father Rick.
“And so, when he realized I love doing what I do, then that's when me and dad became from dad's son to friends. And we can talk, I can talk to him every day, multiple times a day, and just talk,” he said.
It’s a journey that has taken Trickett from his time at West Virginia as a student assistant to a graduate assistant under Nick Saban at Alabama to the same role under Bobby Bowden and Jimbo Fisher at Florida State.
From there, Trickett earned his first time role as an assistant at Samford and has been to five other schools during that time, including back at his alma mater on two separate occasions.
“I was so blessed to get in my early molding years of all-time, College Football Hall of Famers, from the beginning to the end. And so, for me, and it helped me and being my dad's son, you have to find who you are and be who you are,” Trickett said.
Trickett has spent 10 years as an offensive coordinator at various stops and now finds himself back where it all began in Morgantown as the senior offensive assistant.
There have been highs and lows with the job, but the latter is what makes you a better coach. It’s something that his family, which also includes Clint who’s now the offensive coordinator at Jacksonville State, where Rick is the offensive line coach and Chance, who’s a regional scout with the Los Angeles Rams, understands well.
“So, we're all in it. We always think it's a goal to be employed at the end of each year. That's our family goal. So we're here on summer vacation, hey, we're all employed, we're good,” Trickett said.
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