Peters Township's Jason Makrinos finds fit on North Carolina A&T staff, comes home to face Robert Morris

By the time he was 12 years old, Jason Makrinos made up his mind what he wanted to do for a living: be the coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Makes sense. During Makrinos’ youth, Bill Cowher and Co. were regular contenders for the Vince Lombardi Trophy, so, for a kid from Western Pennsylvania, his was not an unusual dream.

Though he remains some distance from attaining that goal, the Peters Township grad is continuing to work his way through the coaching ranks. And while he might not be working for the Steelers, he is working with a couple of ex-Steelers.

Makrinos, who played offensive and defensive line at Westminster, is in his first season as the defensive backs coach at North Carolina A&T. The Aggies are coached by former Steelers DB Sam Washington, and former Steelers defensive lineman Keith Willis also is on the staff at the Greensboro, N.C., school.

On Saturday, Makrinos — not to mention Washington and Willis — will have a homecoming of sorts when North Carolina A&T (3-3, 1-0 Big South) visits Robert Morris (0-6, 0-2). Kickoff at Joe Walton Stadium is scheduled for noon.

Besides the friends and family who will show up to support Makrinos, he will see a lot of familiar faces on the Colonials sideline.

Makrinos is acquainted with RMU coach Bernard Clark and defensive coordinator Dave Plungas. Defensive line coach Darius Davis coached the linemen under Makrinos when he was the defensive coordinator at Division II Findlay. Safeties coach Bart Tanski was a grad assistant when Makrinos was at Findlay, and he hired Robert Morris tight ends coach Delbert Tyler as a GA at Findlay.

“That’s kind of cool in itself,” Makrinos said.

The pleasantries, however, will be reserved for pre- and postgame. The Aggies have their sights set on buttressing their hopes of making the FCS playoffs.

It’s a position Makrinos never envisioned he would be in a year ago.

The life of a coach is transient. It comes with the territory. So does a lack of job security.

After coaching the Kent State safeties last season, Makrinos expected to be back with the Golden Flashes. After all, Kent State led the MAC East in takeaways and interceptions, won the division and went to a bowl game.

But Makrinos was relieved of his duties when the coaching staff was reorganized.

“In all the different scenarios I talked about with my wife, it wasn’t like, ‘Hey, we’re going to go here and win a MAC East championship, go and play in a bowl game for only like the fifth time in Kent State history and get fired,’” he said. “It’s an unfortunate part of the profession, but it’s year by year.”

Fortunately for Makrinos, the coaching fraternity is relatively small, and he had a connection at North Carolina A&T. Aggies defensive coordinator Thomas Howard had worked with Makrinos at Slippery Rock and informed him about the opening on the staff. (Incidentally, A&T has three coaches who worked under legendary Slippery Rock coach George Mihalik: Makrinos, Howard and Willis.)

But going that far away from the comfort of family and friends was daunting.

His wife, Jessica, hails from Canton, Ohio, and all of Makrinos’ coaching stops had been in Pennsylvania or Ohio: Slippery Rock, Kent State, Carnegie Mellon, Duquesne and Findlay, located 120 miles west of Cleveland.

“I did my homework on A&T,” Makrinos said. “I wasn’t going to move my family down here for just any job. It’s a top-tier FCS program. They won four Celebration Bowls (the de facto national championship for Historically Black Colleges and Universities). They’ve beaten multiple FBS teams, guys playing in the NFL, moving to the (Colonial Athletic Association) next year, which is one of the top three conferences in FCS football.

“Deion Sanders has made it even more attractive to go to HBCUs now. He’s helping everyone out. And, I’ll be honest, that’s part of what I looked at when taking the job. I was like, heck, if there was ever a time to coach at an HBCU, now is the time.”

Of course, having the chance to work under Washington was part of the draw.

Makrinos figured being a defensive backs coach under someone who played the position at the highest level might put him in the spotlight a bit more than the other assistants. Still, the opportunity was too good to let slide.

“You’re talking about a guy who, when he played in the NFL, his position coach was Tony Dungy,” Makrinos said. “If I am going to get scrutinized by a guy and learn under a guy, I want to learn from a guy who has learned from the best.”

Washington has been pleased with what Makrinos has contributed.

“He is fitting right in, preaching fundamentals and techniques with our players and adding his own expertise to what we do,” said Washington via the N.C. A&T sports information office. “The secondary is where my heart beats, and I think we found the best defensive backs coach out there.”

As enthusiastic as Washington was to have Makrinos on board, for some of the players, there was, understandably, trepidation. That was particularly true for Amir McNeill.

In a very young defensive backs room, McNeill is by far the elder statesman: a fifth-year senior. Accustomed to doing things a certain way for four years, McNeill was watching Makrinos closely.

“My first impression of him … I ain’t gonna lie. I was like, ‘Damn, this man talks a lot,’ ” McNeill said. “Some coaches, they come in, they show you one side, and then it’s like, ‘That’s not who we met.’ He is literally the same person.

“Always enthusiastic. When he talks, his voice gets high. What you see from the start is what you get.”

What really got McNeill’s attention was the things Makrinos said that had nothing to do with football.

“When we first had our meetings, a lot of times we never talked about football,” McNeill said. “He talked about life, about being disciplined, about having a positive attitude. For weeks straight he tried to install being a better person first before football. Outside of football, you have to work on yourself so it will transfer onto the field.”

On the field, Makrinos’ emphasis has been on takeaways. Besides contributing to Kent State’s success last season, Makrinos said his defenses at Findlay were consistently among the top 10 or 15 in Division II in takeaways.

The ability to wrest the football from the offense, Makrinos believes, is a matter of the right mentality. He said he does a lot to promote takeaways, including ending every defensive backs meeting by having his players exclaim, “The ball is ours!”

McNeill said Makrinos even named the DBs’ group text “The ball is ours.” But what seemed a little silly at first has become a rallying cry for the secondary.

“He basically just wanted us to install in our brain that anytime the ball is in the air, we’ve got to come down with it,” McNeill said. “Yeah, at first we did think it was a little corny. But after a while, in your subconscious, you just start believing it.”

Belief has turned into reality. The Aggies enter the Robert Morris game with eight interceptions through six games — they had seven all last season — and 10 total takeaways.

They lead the Big South in total defense (272 yards per game) and are second in pass defense — behind Robert Morris — at 182 ypg. The defense has 13 pass breakups.

Makrinos hopes the Aggies defense can have another strong performance against Robert Morris and make him 2-0 against the Colonials. The last time he faced Robert Morris was in 2014 as co-defensive coordinator at Duquesne, and the Dukes won 22-0.

Moreover, a win Saturday would give A&T its first road victory of the season, and to get it in Pittsburgh, Makrinos said, would be special.

Makrinos is confident the Aggies can continue to build toward a championship. That could further burnish his resume for what he hopes is the next logical step: becoming a head coach.

When that happens is anyone’s guess. For now, Makrinos is content in Greensboro and at peace with the decision to take the job at A&T.

“It’s been everything that I thought it was,” he said. “This is a national product we can sell here at this university: No. 1 HBCU in the U.S. from a size standpoint, academic reputation standpoint, so the future is as bright as can be here.”