New Arizona defensive line coach Joe Seumalo is one of several Wildcats' assistants who migrated to Tucson with head coach Brent Brennan from San Jose State. Seumalo has had a varied coaching career. Before becoming a college assistant, Seumalo was the head coach at Kaiser High School in Honolulu.
Seumalo was a guest coach for the BC Lions in the Canadian Football League and an assistant coach with the Hawaii Hammerheads in the Indoor Football League. The first college job for Seumalo was as a graduate assistant at Hawaii in 1999 and 2000. The first full-time assistant job for Seumalo was at Cal Poly from 2001-04.
Seumalo had his first stint at San Jose State under former Arizona coach Dick Tomey in 2005. The first power conference job for Seumalo and his longest stint in a position was at Oregon State from 2006 through 2014. Seumalo's son Isaac entering his ninth season played for him at Oregon State
Seumalo spent a season at UNLV and Arizona State before Brennan hired him in 2017. At San Jose State, Seumalo coached future Mountain West Defensive Player of the Year and three-time All-Conference defensive end Viliami Fehoko. Fehoko finished his San Jose State career fifth in program history with 23 sacks.
In parts of five seasons that included redshirting in 2018, Fehoko added 191 tackles, 46.0 tackles for loss, 14 pass breakups, two fumble recoveries and five forced fumbles. Fehoko was a fourth-round pick of the Dallas Cowboys in 2023. Dallas waived Fehoko with an injury designation on Monday.
Cade Hall also earned first-team All-Mountain West on the defensive line with San Jose in 2022 playing with Fehoko. Chris Gocong from Cal Poly and Stephen Paea the 2010 Pac-12 Conference Defensive Player of the Year also went on to NFL careers as players coached by Seumalo.
Seumalo built good defensive lines at Oregon State and San Jose State. Oregon State finished 32nd nationally averaging 2.5 sacks per game under Seumalo in 2010. San Jose State was 12th in 2020 averaging 3.25 sacks per game and 12th in 2022 at 3.25 sacks per game.
San Jose State was also stout against the run in recent seasons under Seumalo. The Spartans were 11th allowing 3.24 yards per carry in 2020, 22nd allowing 3.25 YPC in 2021 and eighth at 3.24 YPC in 2022 before plummetting last season. Seumalo will have a rebuilt Arizona defensive line to work with in 2024.
Defensive end Tre Smith who transferred from San Jose State had 66 tackles, 9.5 TFLs, 6.5 sacks and 1.0 forced fumble playing under Seumalo last season. Ta'ita'i Uiagalelei had 21 tackles, 4.5 TFLs, and 1.0 sack in 2023. Kevon Darton transferred from Syracuse where he had 96 tackles, 12.0 TFLs, and 5.0 sacks in the last two seasons.
The Arizona defensive line has a lot of potential in 2024. Seumalo has proven the ability to get the most of the defensive line during his career. Arizona has a pair of preseason All-Big XII players on defense in linebacker Jacob Manu and cornerback Tacario Davis. If Arizona can get production from the DL they can have a stout defense.