When Sonny Dykes was shopping for an offensive coordinator to bring with him to SMU, he knew what he wanted.
He was fishing for complements. A descendant of the Mike Leach Air Raid coaching tree, Dykes knew the passing game and concepts to make it work. He wanted a mind capable of adding in a dose of running game expertise. He found one across his new conference but had to travel nearly 1,700 miles to Storrs, Conn. to find him. Rhett Lashlee, who spent most of his career working under Auburn coach Gus Malzahn, is making his first stop in Texas in hopes of melding Malzahn’s run-heavy system with Dykes’ quick-strike passing attack.