Montreal Alouettes Add Don Matthews, Turk Schonert To Staff
By Jared Book
The Montreal Alouettes have announced they have added former head coach and CFL coaching legend Don Matthews and former Buffalo Bills offensive coordinator Turk Schonert to their coaching staff as consultants.
Matthews is no stranger to the Alouettes. He was the head coach of the team from 2002-2006 and had 58 regular season wins, five playoffs wins and four East Division titles, guiding the Alouettes to three Grey Cup appearances in 2002, 2003 and 2005 and winning one.
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He was also a consultant at the end of last season and notably is a big fan of Troy Smith and Tyrell Sutton saying the latter reminded him of former Alouettes legend Mike Pringle. Not long after saying that, Sutton saw a bigger role in the Alouettes backfield.
Matthews is also one of the winningest head coaches in CFL history. He had top spot until Wally Buono passed him.
Schonert is a newcomer to the CFL but is another offensive mind as the Alouettes try to get out of their current slump. Schonert was a quarterback in the NFL from 1981-1989 for Cincinnati and Atlanta. He was then a Quarterbacks coach for several teams including the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Buffalo Bills, Carolina Panthers, New York Giants and New Orleans Saints.
He became the Bills offensive coordinator in 2008. He has most recently been the head coach of the United Football League’s Sacramento Mountain Lions in 2012 and has 15 years of professional coaching experience.
I wouldn’t necessarily think that this means that one of these will become a defacto offensive coordinator, but I think this is the team trying to bring as many heads into this as possible to try and get the best results.
This could mean Schonert may become a full-time coach with the team replacing or complimenting Ryan Dinwiddie as quarterbacks coach or it may not. Either way, it’s nice to see the team taking this step to always try for some improvement.
With Jim Popp locked in as general manager, the team can move forward and we know how Popp is always looking for talent. Marc Trestman, if you recall, was brought in as a guest coach several times before becoming the head coach of the team.