Morgan Scalley typed in his password, clicked through a few tabs and opened a spreadsheet on his laptop.
The University of Utah’s defensive coordinator meticulously prepares for opponents. But this document — row after row — made no mention of schemes, football or the Utah Utes. Rather, it’s filled with pages full of autobiographies, novels and documentaries. Some he’s spent hours reviewing, others he plans to study.
All of them are about Black American history. He’s examined the histories of notable figures like Dred Scott and Harriet Tubman in an effort to educate, understand and empathize.
“I’m still working through some of these topics in our history and educating myself,” Scalley said. “I watched all these documentaries, I read all these books, just so that going forward, if there’s ever something where I could shed a light or be a light or educate people, I would be ready.”
Scalley views the spreadsheet as an exercise in both education and atonement.
Four years ago, a social media post revealed that the Ute coach had used a racist slur in a 2013 text message. Scalley admitted to using the slur. And, after an independent investigation, Utah Athletic Director Mark Harlan and head coach Kyle Whittingham cut the Utes defensive coordinator’s salary in half and reduced his contract to a one-year deal.
The heir apparent to Whittingham, Scalley also then lost his “head coach in waiting” title.
Four years later, Scalley has regained the trust of Utah’s administration. The U. announced in July it gave him a new contract last November, that would pay him $2 million this season in a deal that runs through 2027.
Most significantly, it features an agreement that will make him Utah’s next head coach. That deal will kick in when Whittingham retires, entrusting him with an initial five-year deal that will pay a minimum of $5 million annually.
“I’ve seen his growth on the field, off the field,” Harlan told The Salt Lake Tribune. “He’s an incredible husband, incredible dad, an incredible mentor to many young men in my time with him. I would also say the way he responded to the incident … which was serious and significant, was very impressive. We hit him hard, which was deserving, and we expected him to learn and grow.
“But he didn’t do just that. He prospered.”
Clearly, Scalley, Utah’s athletic administration, and those close to the former safety believe he’s done enough to make amends. Here’s an inside look at the steps he’s taken.
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) University of Utah defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley as the Utah Utes are hosted by Utah State during NCAA football in Logan, Utah on Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024.
‘I know I’m not a racist’
After Scalley admitted to sending the 2013 text, the University of Utah hired a law firm to investigate the suspended coordinator.
Husch Blackwell spoke with 35 people connected to Utah’s football program, including 23 current and former athletes. According to the law firm, most of the players did not report any usage of derogatory terms or racist language by Scalley.
Scalley admitted to making a joke about Polynesians and Native Americans, which some athletic employees deemed racist.
Scalley denied some of the allegations in the report. He also denies being a racist.
“I know I’m not a racist. I despise people that are racist,” he said. “You watch the movies and you’re like ‘How does that happen?’ And then all of a sudden you’re ‘it’ in other people’s eyes.”
Former players who spoke to The Tribune agreed with the coordinator.
“We’ll start off by saying, he’s definitely not racist,” former Utah defensive back and current Buffalo Bills safety Terrell Burgess told The Tribune. “I went through four years with him, and everybody has their own opinion, but I can assure you, he is not racist by any means necessary.”
Scalley described using the racist slur in 2013 as poor judgment, not racism.
But afterward, he said, he wanted to face the fire. He wanted to learn and to understand.
“I’m willing to own it,” Scalley told The Tribune. “The blessing is, again, the things that have come from it.”
That’s why, when angry social media posts called Scalley a racist, he told his family not to defend him. He knew he had to show his growth through long-term actions, not defensive rebuttals and hurried social media posts.
“I think we all have moments where we would like to have something back,” former Utes quarterback Brian Johnson said. “I think being able to accept responsibility and accountability for actions that you know aren’t in your nature or aren’t who you want to be is all about having the growth mindset and continuing to evolve.”
Scalley now looks forward and accepts that this is part of his story. He says he won’t stop growing from that moment.
But the past stays with him.
It’s made him the man he is today — and the head coach he said he’ll be in the future.
“It just consumed me,” Scalley said.
(Leah Hogsten | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah Utes head coach Kyle Whittingham is hugged and congratulated by assistant coach Morgan Scalley. The Utes defeated the Oregon Ducks to win the 2021 Pac12 Football Championship title at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Dec 3, 2021.
‘Typically the guy picking people up’
Morgan Scalley and Bo Nagahi sat in a room full of captains on Urban Meyer’s Utah leadership committee in 2004, debating whether they would kick a starter off the team who had broken team rules.
Guided by Scalley, the leadership committee assembled a set of grueling workouts for the player. If he would grind through them, his teammates decided, he would remain on the team.
“God knows what would happen if we kicked him off,” Nagahi said. “I don’t think it would be a good thing. It could certainly be downhill from there. ... All he really had was us as a team and football.”
But when it came time for those workouts, Scalley asked Nagahi a question: “You think we can get through this ourselves?” So, at Scalley’s nudging, they completed the workouts, shoulder to shoulder with their troubled teammate, enduring a punishment they had handed down.
“Morgan was typically the guy picking people up,” said Nagahi, who played for the Utes from 2001-04. “But ... when Morgan Scalley gets on the field, he just turns into like a starved lion.”
Blake Burdette, Scalley’s college football and high school rugby teammate, attests to that.
The pair played together for the Utes from 2002-04. Burdette remembers Scalley’s riveting locker-room speeches. The on-field intensity. The scowls at teammates demanding they bring their best. And the times he’d sing Sam Cooke songs in the locker room following two-a-days when teammates were too exhausted to talk.
But Burdette’s favorite memory is when he was about to quit the Utes football team. The walk-on was paying for school out of pocket and announced he was going to leave after fall camp.
Then, at the end of his final practice, Meyer announced that the walk-on was getting a scholarship.
Scalley was the first teammate to greet his friend with a massive hug.
“Morgan was a leader on the team,” Burdette said. “Morgan was that guy that everybody looked up to and to have him do that just meant a ton to me. I’ll never forget that moment.”
It’s the totality of those moments — not the slur — that Nagahi, Burdette and others said should define Scalley.
“I stand behind Morgan 100%,” Nagahi said. “I know who he is. I’ve been through a lot with him.”
Said Burdette: “Morgan cares about relationships. One thing you’ve seen him do is just put his head down and get to work and prove that that wasn’t him.”
(Meg Oliphant | Special to The Tribune) Utah defensive coordinator Morgan Scalley walks off the field at the end of the first half against the Penn State Nittany Lions at Rose Bowl Stadium on Jan. 2, 2023 in Pasadena, Calif.
‘The way you do one thing is how you do everything’
On the night before Utah football games, some players will gather for a movie night. Others assemble for a group dinner.
But Scalley and some select defensive stalwarts often huddle to watch more film. These small group sessions are one more moment to educate and shine a light, to measure his players’ commitment and to foster a culture of accountability.
If a player missed a read or tackle, Scalley would call them out.
That Friday tradition was a favorite of former Utah safety and now-Buffalo Bills rookie Cole Bishop, one of the many defenders to land in the pros after playing for Scalley.
“He was very good about building relationships with players,” Bishop said. “He’s trying to just get the best out of them.”
Scalley’s family said he applies that culture of accountability to himself, too. No more so than he had to in 2020 when he had to explain his use of a racist slur to Utah’s administration, to his fellow coaches, to his players and to his loved ones.
“He wanted to learn everything he didn’t know, and wanted to make sure, as a family, that we were better educated from it,” Rachel Orison, Scalley’s sister, told The Tribune. “We didn’t just get over it but we were changed by it, you know. I feel like the world in general, not just what happened to my brother, changed in 2020.”
During a time when the COVID-19 pandemic slowed life down and the death of George Floyd sparked a national conversation about racism in America, Scalley sat with the pain he’d caused and tried to chart a new way forward.
“I think he went above and beyond what was asked of him,” said Taylor Scalley, Morgan’s brother. “To meet with key folks at the university dealing with diversity, meeting with key influential people in the community, asking what books to read. Trying to do a better job of understanding his student athletes, who the majority of them are Black.
“He’ll never truly understand what it means to go through what they have to, and so he’s done everything possible to try to relate and understand.”
Over the past three years, Scalley created a teaching program he titled EUEA (Education leads to Understanding leads to Empathy leads to Action) that he’s shown each of his players. He’s presented it at high schools across the state.
In his slideshow, he presents figures from all different backgrounds and ethnicities, then asks his audience to find similarities with the person and then point out their differences.
“He’s different than you,” Scalley said, while showcasing the presentation on his computer. “The reason you can tell he’s different is because on the outside, and it’s very easy on the outside to tell someone’s different than you. It’s harder to find out how they’re similar to you.
“In building relationships, focusing on differences can lead to overgeneralization. You see different people and try to understand that everyone’s going through something. And if they’re not going through something, maybe their sibling is, maybe their parent is, right? And if we were just better to each other, kinder to each other, if we just took the time to understand, things would be better.”
Scalley was also a part of a university group, put in place by Harlan, that met several times a week and discussed inclusion and equity on campus. He would then help apply those takeaways within Utah’s football program.
“That’s what we talk about with our players,” Scalley told The Tribune. “This has to be a safe space where we can talk and we can communicate. … It requires you to get out of your comfort zone and get to know people. We do this with every one of our guys.
“I do believe it has allowed me to learn so much more than maybe if it hadn’t happened. I wouldn’t be as well educated or better prepared for what is to come.”
Britain Covey, a Ute from 2015-21 and now a receiver with the Philadelphia Eagles, sat in meetings where Scalley just listened to his players. In other meetings, Covey said, the coach talked about what he’d learned.
“I think he did a very good job of laying everything out on the table,” Covey said of the meetings. “Everybody could ask him questions, and he could ask everybody questions. It was just a good environment. It wasn’t a toxic environment. It was a very safe environment where you felt no ill will.”
Covey still recites some of the quotes Scalley regularly shares with players. One in particular stands out:
The way you do one thing is how you do everything.
“He takes it very seriously,” Covey said. “If you see him do anything, if he’s cleaning the dishes, you know he’s doing the entire sink, if he’s mowing the lawn, he’s also hedging the trees.”
That’s why Scalley went all in to educate himself and understand the backgrounds of those he hurt.
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Morgan Scalley as the Utah Utes host the Southern Utah Thunderbirds, NCAA football in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Aug. 29, 2024.
‘I’ve had to do the work’
Since the early 2000s, the Utes have always passed the torch to a coach hand-picked by their predecessor. And Kyle Whittingham knew long ago that Scalley would be his pick.
“He is completely invested,” the legendary Utah coach told The Tribune during Big 12 Media Days. “From my estimation, there will be a seamless transition when that transition has taken place.”
From Meyer to Whittingham to, one day, Scalley.
Until Scalley put that succession plan in question.
When Scalley was stripped of his “head coach in waiting” title, another former Utah safety went to bat for him. Eric Weddle, the former Utes star and NFL champion, said he spoke with Harlan shortly after Scalley was suspended in 2020. Weddle said he told Harlan not to succumb to the outsiders, that he could trust Scalley to redeem himself.
Four years later, Weddle celebrated as Harlan and the U. put the coach-in-waiting clause back in Scalley’s contract.
“This is a great decision and will only make our program better in the long run,” Weddle said. “You can’t have an outsider take over Utah football. There’s zero chance that would ever fly with any of us. So an in-house guy who’s been developed and grown into this role is exactly who we need.
“To get that back into writing has been a testament to who he is and the work that he’s done to come back from that.”
Sitting in his office one day before the start of the season, Scalley closed the spreadsheet and the laptop, and reflected on the past four years and what he still has ahead of him.
“They don’t have to hire me,” Scalley said. “I’m the head coach-in-waiting. I’m not the head coach. I saw that they want me here long-term. They want me to continue what’s been going on and that was awesome.
“But I’ve had to do the work.”
Editor’s note • This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.
