The NFL coaching carousel may be winding down, but its ripple effects are still being felt across the college football landscape. And once again, the Oklahoma Sooners find themselves on the receiving end of that shake-up. On Monday morning, the Buffalo Bills made a key addition to their defensive staff, hiring Oklahoma’s assistant head coach and co-defensive coordinator Jay Valai as their next cornerbacks coach.
Valai’s departure is a significant one for Brent Venables and the Sooners. Since arriving in Norman in 2022, Valai has been instrumental in shaping a defense that quietly became one of the stingiest units in the country.
Oklahoma finished this past season ranked sixth nationally in total defense - a testament to the cohesion, physicality, and discipline of a group that thrived on the back end. Valai’s fingerprints were all over that success.
Now, he heads to Buffalo to join a retooling Bills defense that’s looking to stay competitive in the AFC arms race. Valai will coach the cornerbacks, bringing with him a résumé that’s both diverse and fast-rising. For the Sooners, though, this is a tough loss - not just because of what Valai brought to the field, but because of the recruiting clout and leadership he carried off of it.
Valai’s coaching journey has been a steady climb through some of the sport’s most respected programs. After a playing career at Wisconsin, he got his coaching start under Kirby Smart at Georgia, working as a defensive quality control coach. From there, he spent a season with Andy Reid and the Kansas City Chiefs in a similar role - a stint that gave him a taste of NFL culture and expectations.
His first on-field coaching job came in 2019 at Rutgers, where he served as cornerbacks coach. That led to short but impactful stops at Texas and Alabama, where he continued to build his reputation as a technician and motivator in the secondary. But it was at Oklahoma where Valai truly settled in, taking on more responsibility as co-defensive coordinator and assistant head coach under Venables.
In Norman, Valai helped transform the Sooners’ defense into a unit that could go toe-to-toe with anyone. The secondary, in particular, became a strength - fast, aggressive, and opportunistic.
That kind of performance doesn’t go unnoticed, especially at the NFL level. And now, the Bills are betting on Valai to bring that same energy and expertise to their defensive backfield.
For Oklahoma, the challenge now becomes twofold: replace a rising star on the staff and do it in a way that keeps the rest of the coaching room intact. With college staffs increasingly vulnerable to NFL poaching, Venables will likely move quickly to promote from within or bring in a fresh face who can maintain the defensive momentum. Don’t be surprised if someone internally gets elevated to co-defensive coordinator - a strategic move that could help prevent another assistant from being lured away.
The college-to-NFL pipeline isn’t new, but when a coach like Jay Valai makes the jump, it’s a reminder of how interconnected these two worlds have become. For Oklahoma, it’s a tough loss.
For Buffalo, it’s a promising addition. And for Valai, it’s the next step in what’s shaping up to be a very impressive coaching career.