70 Days Until WCU Football Kickoff - Greg McGruder

It's now 70 days until the kickoff of Catamount Football on Thursday, August 29, 2024, against the North Carolina State Wolfpack in Carter-Finley Stadium, Raleigh, NC 

To help pass those long summer days, and hopefully get the Catamount faithful a little more excited about the upcoming season, and knowledgeable of the team members, we'll continue the football countdown each day until kickoff day.

No one is currently assigned to #70, so we will highlight an assistant coach:

Greg McGruder

TITLE Assistant Coach / Wide Receivers

After spending three seasons on the Catamount football staff as a quality control coach working with the offense, Greg McGruder was promoted to wide receiver coach in January 2024.

Working with the WCU offensive unit from 2021-2023, McGruder was a part of an an offense that broke the school record for total offense twice with 5,339 total yards in 2022 eclipsed by a record 5,545 yards last fall in 2023. WCU also scored an average of 33.9 points per game on an average of 486.8 yards of total offense since 2021.

Before coming to Cullowhee, he spent the 2021 season as a graduate assistant coach at Tusculum. He aided the Pioneers’ offensive staff working primarily with the quarterbacks on Tusculum’s spring 2021 South Atlantic Conference (SAC) championship squad.

Tusculum averaged 533.4 yards and scored an average of 37.6 points per game offensively in 2021 on the way to the conference title. The Pioneers averaged nearly 400 passing yards per game to lead the SAC, scoring 15 touchdowns through the air in 2021. In addition, the offensive unit added 139.2 yards per game on the ground and 12 additional scores.

McGruder previously served as a student assistant with the Jacksonville football program during the 2015 season. That year, the Dolphins posted a 9-2 record and he helped with an offense that posted 30.5 points per game and generated 400 yards of total offense per contest, led by former WCU offensive coordinator Kade Bell who was JU's starting quarterback.

During his prep career at the University Christian High School in Jacksonville, Fla., McGruder was a three-year letterman as a defensive back.

McGruder is a 2016 graduate from the University of North Florida majoring in sport management. He earned a Master of Arts degree from Tusculum in 2021.