Best makes move to Eagles' head coach job

It didn't take long, and Eastern Washington didn't have to go far to find the person to follow ultra-successful former head football coach Beau Baldwin.

The Eagles' offensive line coach, and a former student athlete, Aaron Best, was introduced Jan. 23 as the program's new head coach - its 21st in program history - in the same room where only a week earlier, Baldwin announced his surprise departure to become the offensive coordinator at the University of California-Berkeley.

"Searches are about the right fit at the right time," Eastern athletics director Bill Chaves said. "You always try to look at some degree internally, and we're just so excited that the right fit was within our four walls at this stage of the game."

Best, married and a father of three, turns 39, Friday, Jan. 27.

"I appreciate the opportunity from the bottom of my heart," Best said. He is just the second Eastern graduate to become EWU's head football coach in more than 50 years. The first, former defensive back Dick Zornes in 1979.

At the press conference in the Red Reese Room at EWU, the self-deprecating Best, re-told a tale about Zornes, who he greatly admires.

"He (Zornes) was the athletic director here at the time (I arrived), and the first thing he asked (then assistant) coach (Paul) Wulff was, 'you recruited this kid?'" Best said. "From there our friendship blossomed. I appreciate and thank Paul Wulff wholeheartedly for giving me the opportunity to be a student-athlete here."

While he follows a one-time quarterback, Baldwin, in the head coach position, Best, ultimately became an All-American and is the latest in a lineage of offensive linemen to be a head coach at Eastern, including Wulff and current Idaho State coach Mike Kramer.

Best's office was just two doors away from Baldwin, but now he'll have the bigger space, lamenting that he had just - within the last two years at least and with the help of his wife, Kim - gotten the photos up on the walls in the old digs.

Best came to Eastern in 1996, graduating from Curtis High School in Tacoma, the same school Baldwin graduated from a few years earlier. He was a student-assistant in 2000, a grad-assistant the following year and then promoted to offensive line coach in 2002 through 2006 and then for the past nine seasons under Baldwin. He spent 2007 in Canada as an assistant coach for the Toronto Argonauts and returned to Eastern in 2008.

"I went to Curtis and coach Baldwin went to Curtis, and people seem to think we graduated in the same class. Untrue - he is older," Best said. "Before I worked for him, I rooted for him some 30 years ago."

Baldwin amassed an impressive string of accomplishments at Eastern since his hiring in January 2008, most notably the 2010 Football Championship Subdivision national championship, plus three other trips to the FCS's semifinal round. Baldwin was 85-32 overall and 58-14 in the Big Sky Conference where his teams won or shared five league championships.

"How do you succeed a Beau Baldwin after he's had such an unbelievable nine-year tenure?" Chaves asked when commenting on Best's hiring. "I think Aaron's the right guy to take all of those positive attributes and then add his secret sauce on it."

As was the case for Baldwin, Best's first game will be in Lubbock, Texas against Texas Tech on Sept. 2.

Aaron Best at a glance:

Best was born Jan. 27, 1978, in Tacoma, Wash. He and the former Kim Walker were married on July 15, 2007, in Everett, Wash. They have three children – one son, Tank (8), and two daughters, Tenli (6) and Texis (3). Education: Bachelor’s degree in social science, Eastern Washington University, 2001. Graduate of Curtis High School in Tacoma, Wash., 1996.

Paul Delaney can be reached at [email protected].