Kyle Whittingham hasn’t been on the job at Michigan long, but the longtime Utah head coach has already made his first mistake in Ann Arbor. I guess it’s good to get it out of the way.
On Thursday, ESPN’s Adam Rittenberg reported that Michigan is hiring former Penn State wide receivers coach Marques Hagans to his staff. Hagans will serve as an assistant wide receivers coach under former Utah assistant Micah Simon, who joined Whittingham in Ann Arbor to coach the position.
Source: Michigan is expected to hire Marques Hagans as assistant wide receivers coach. Hagans coached Penn State’s receivers the past few years and worked with Michigan OC Jason Beck at Virginia, where Hagans was a longtime assistant. pic.twitter.com/IKYcpTSYoZ
— Adam Rittenberg (@ESPNRittenberg) January 1, 2026
Michigan hires Marques Hagans as assistant wide receiver coach
It’s a fairly low-stakes move, an assistant wide receiver coach, but it’s still hard to see why Michgian was so eager to add Hagans to the staff. He arrived at Penn State in 2023 as James Franklin’s wide receiver coach and offensive recruiting coordinator.
During his tenure in Happy Valley, Penn State’s wide receivers struggled mightily, including in last season’s Orange Bowl College Football Playoff semifinal loss to Notre Dame. On that big stage, Hagans’s wide receivers finished with zero catches, which prompted Franklin to overhaul the position through the transfer portal, letting Omari Evans leave for Washington and Harrison Wallace III transfer to Ole Miss while importing Devonte Ross from Troy, Kyron Hudson from USC, and eventually, Trebor Pena from Syracuse.
2025 four-star Koby Howard showed flashes this past season, but the Nittany Lions didn’t develop a single home-grown wide receiver during Hagans’s time with the program, and that failure was one of the biggest reasons that they were routinely overmatched by the likes of Ohio State, Oregon, and Notre Dame.
Simon's track record is certainly more impressive than Hagans', but it would certainly be helpful to Penn State and the rest of the Big Ten if Hagans replicated the struggles he had in Happy Valley in Ann Arbor. Former five-star QB Bryce Underwood had a bit of an underwhelming true freshman season, but that was at least partially due to Michigan's lack of explosive weapons on the outside. If Whittingham can put elite pass-catchers around his highly-touted QB, the Wolverines could be one of the scariest offenses in the country and shoot right back to the top of the Big Ten.
While Hagans is taking a demotion in Ann Arbor, Penn State will be in much better hands with Noah Pauley arriving from Iowa State to remain on Matt Campbell’s staff. Pauley served as Campbell’s wide receiver coach and passing game coordinator in Ames and was integral in the development of Jayden Higgins and Jaylin Noel, two former three-star recruits who blossomed into Day 2 picks of the Houston Texans in the 2025 NFL Draft.