There will be another recently familiar face on the Mississippi State sideline for 2026. Coach Jeff Lebby is bringing back Matt Brock as part of his revamped coaching staff for the upcoming third season with Bulldog football.
Brock, an assistant coach and one-season coordinator for the Bulldogs in 2020-2023, will be reunited with his former boss Zach Arnett as part of the ’26 defensive staff. Arnett is returning to coordinate this side of the squad while Brock come back to presumably take care of linebackers again as he did for four seasons. Brock also was in charge of Mississippi State special teams for his first two seasons in Starkville.
Brock is expected to formally join the 2026 staff after his current UConn team completes their season in the Fenway Bowl on December 27. This allows him just enough time to head South and take over the Bulldog defense for the Duke’s Bowl on January 2.
These changes follow the dismissal of two-season coordinator Coleman Hutzler, who also coached linebackers for Lebby in 2024-25.
Arnett was also safeties coach while coordinating the defense for the late Coach Mike Leach 2020-22 before his promotion to head coach for the 2023 season. Now the coach who succeeded him is reuniting Arnett and Brock to bring Bulldog defense back to expected standards.
For his first two years working under Arnett and Leach, Brock’s role was with outside linebackers. In 2022 he took over the entire unit, and helped inside linebacker Nate Watson develop into a second-team All-SEC pick. By 2023 Watson was not only first team consensus all-league, he was the SEC’s Defensive Player of the Year.
Meanwhile Watson was having to duel teammate Jett Johnson just to lead the SEC in tackles, which the pair of inside ‘backers did alternating in 2022 and ’23. Johnson made second-team All-League as a senior.
Brock comes back to Starkville after two seasons on staff with Connecticut as defensive coordinator for Coach Jim Mora. The Huskies went 9-3 this year as one of college football’s surprise stories.
Mora just took the Colorado State job. Saturday, UConn announced Jason Candle as head coach. Bulldog fans will remember Candle as coach of the Toledo team which came to Starkville and beat Lebby’s first State squad last year.
Prior to joining up with Arnett, Brock was outside linebackers and specials teams coach for Leach at Washington State 2018-19. He had worked the previous two years at Bowling Green in the same roles. From 2013-15 he was first an analyst and then linebackers coach at Texas Tech.
Brock turned 37 years of age last October. He holds a 2011 bachelor’s degree from Baker University where he played linebacker and led his conference in tackles as well as earning Academic All-America honors twice.
Other changes on the defensive side of the staff room appear to be pending in a major winter overhaul for Lebby after two frustrating seasons. What those changes, either forced or for a retirement, will be is playing out in coming days now that signing season for high school and junior college players is nearly completed.
Lebby also now has a coordinator with a track record to settle questions by current Bulldogs about their own futures, as well as prepare for the upcoming January 2-16 opening of the NCAA’s transfer window.