Ike Hilliard To Lead Cal Wide Receivers

Travers Family Head Football Coach Tosh Lupoi announced Friday the hiring of veteran NFL player and coach Ike Hilliard as the program's wide receivers coach. In addition, Hilliard will hold a co-offensive coordinator title.

Hilliard worked with a long list of the league's top wide receivers during 13 seasons as an NFL coach, including five who combined for six 1,000-yard receiving seasons under his watch in Brandon Marshall (Miami); Pierre Garcon and DeSean Jackson (Washington); Diontae Johnson (Pittsburgh); and Drake London (Atlanta). Johnson (2021) and London (2024) both had their most productive NFL seasons when tutored by Hilliard, with Johnson also earning a Pro Bowl selection in 2021. Others on the list of NFL players coached by Hilliard include Jamison Crowder, Josh Doctson, Terry McLaurin and Santana Moss (Washington); Robert Woods (Buffalo); Chase Claypool and JuJu Smith-Schuster (Pittsburgh); and Darnell Moody (Atlanta).

Hilliard's first NFL coaching job came as the wide receivers coach with Miami (2011) before he would spend seven of the next eight NFL seasons in the same role with Washington (2012, 2014-19) with one campaign in Buffalo (2013) in between his two Washington stints. He later coached for two seasons at both Pittsburgh (2020-21) and Atlanta (2004-05), while working his lone college coaching position in between at Auburn (2022). Hilliard began his coaching career by spending two seasons working with the wide receivers of the USFL's Florida Tuskers (2009-10), with both squads reaching the league's championship game. 

Hilliard's 13 seasons as an NFL coach were highlighted by three teams that were division winners, with Washington taking the NFC East title in both 2012 and 2015, while Pittsburgh was the NFC North champion in 2020. The Steelers added an AFC Wild Card season in 2021. 

Hilliard coached four NFL teams that ranked among the league's top 10 in passing, highlighted by a 2016 Washington squad that was third with an average of 309.25 passing yards per game for an offense that set single-season team records in total offense (403.4 ypg), yards per play (6.4 ypp), net passing yards (4,758) and completions (407), among others. Washington's 2016 offense was also the team's first since 1999 to feature a pair of 1,000-yard receivers in Garcon and Jackson. Jackson averaged an NFL-best 20.9 yards per reception in 2014 when he was the first Washington player to finish a season as the NFL leader in yards per reception since Henry Ellard (19.5 in 1996). In 2017, Hilliard guided a young wide receiver corps that helped quarterback Kirk Cousins become the first player in team history to record a third consecutive 4,000-yard passing season. He coached McLaurin to a spot on the Pro Football Writers of America All-Rookie Team in 2019 when he had 58 receptions for 919 yards with seven touchdown catches.

Hilliard played wide receiver for a dozen campaigns in the league before embarking on his coaching career and was a member of the 2000 New York Giants squad that won the NFC Championship and participated in Super Bowl XXXV. Hilliard played in 161 career regular-season games with 106 starts over a 12-year career with the Giants (1997-2004) and Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2005-08). He finished with 546 career receptions for 6,397 yards receiving with 35 touchdown catches.

Hilliard was selected in the first round (seventh overall pick) of the 1997 NFL Draft after winning a national championship and earning consensus First-Team All-America honors as well as First-Team All-SEC and Biletnikoff Award semifinalist recognition in his final collegiate season as a 2016 junior at Florida. Hilliard played in 32 collegiate games and finished with 126 receptions for 2,214 yards receiving and 29 touchdown catches. In his final collegiate game, he recorded seven catches for 150 yards with three touchdown grabs to help the Gators to a 52-20 Sugar Bowl win over Florida State to secure the school's first national title. He is a member of the school's Athletic Hall of Fame (Class of 2009).

Hilliard earned a bachelor's degree in criminal justice from Florida that he had worked on over the years after leaving the Gators with one season of eligibility remaining to enter the 1997 NFL Draft.

Hilliard prepped at Patterson High School in Patterson, Louisiana.