Pete Carroll

Peter Clay Carroll (born September 15, 1951) is an American football executive and former coach who is an advisor and executive vice president for the Seattle Seahawks of the National Football League (NFL).

Carroll was born on September 15, 1951, in San Francisco, California, the son of Rita (née Ban) and James Edward "Jim" Carroll.

Two of his paternal great-grandparents were Irish immigrants, and his Croatian maternal grandparents emigrated from around the region of Šibenik.

He was raised in Greenbrae, California, and attended Greenbrae School.

Carroll attended Redwood High School in Larkspur, California.

He was a multi-sport star in football (playing quarterback, wide receiver, and defensive back), basketball, and baseball, earning the school's Athlete of the Year honors as a senior in 1969.

At Pacific, Carroll played free safety for two years for the Tigers, earning All-Pacific Coast Athletic Association honors both years (1971–72) and earning his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration in 1973.

After graduation, Carroll tried out for the Honolulu Hawaiians of the World Football League at their training camp in Riverside but did not make the team due to shoulder problems combined with his small size.

Carroll's energetic and positive personality made a good impression on his head coach, Chester Caddas.

When Caddas found out Carroll was interested in coaching, he offered him a job as a graduate assistant on his staff at Pacific.

Carroll agreed and enrolled as a graduate student, earning a secondary teaching credential and Master's degree in physical education in 1976, while serving as a graduate assistant for three years and working with the wide receivers and secondary defenders.

The assistants at Pacific during this time included a number of other future successful coaches, including Greg Robinson, Jim Colletto, Walt Harris, Ted Leland, and Bob Cope.

Carroll spent the 1977 season as a graduate assistant working with the secondary under Cope.

During his season with Arkansas, he met his future offensive line coach Pat Ruel, also a graduate assistant, as well as the future head coach of the Razorbacks Houston Nutt, who was a backup quarterback.

Arkansas' Defensive Coordinator at the time, Monte Kiffin, would be a mentor to Carroll.

The Razorbacks won the 1978 Orange Bowl that season.

The following season, Carroll moved to Iowa State University, where he was again an assistant working on the secondary under Earle Bruce.

When Bruce moved on to Ohio State University, he again hired Carroll to coach the secondary.

The Ohio State squad made it to the 1980 Rose Bowl where they lost to USC.

When Monte Kiffin was named head coach of North Carolina State University in 1980, he brought Carroll in as his defensive coordinator and secondary coach.

In 1983, Bob Cope became head coach of Pacific and brought Carroll on as assistant head coach and offensive coordinator.

Carroll left Pacific after a year and entered the NFL in 1984 as the defensive backs coach of the Buffalo Bills.

The next year, he moved on to work with the Minnesota Vikings, where he held a similar position for five seasons (1985–89).

In 1989, he was a candidate for the head coaching position at Stanford University; the position went to Dennis Green.

His success with the Vikings led to his hiring by the New York Jets, where he served as defensive coordinator under Bruce Coslet for four seasons (1990–93).

Carroll and Coslet had known each other for many years by that time, as Carroll's older brother was Coslet's college roommate.

When there was an opening for the Vikings' head coach position in 1992, he was a serious candidate but lost the position, again to Green.

Beginning his head coaching career on the professional level, Carroll saw minimal success with the New York Jets in 1994 and the New England Patriots from 1997 to 1999.

Shifting to college football with USC, he revitalized the struggling program into a top-ranked contender, winning seven consecutive conference championships and two consecutive AP National Championships.

Carroll was inducted into the Pacific Athletic Hall of Fame in 1995.

After graduating from Pacific, Carroll's colleague Bob Cope was hired by the University of Arkansas and he convinced Lou Holtz, then the head coach of the Razorbacks, to also hire Carroll.

He was previously the head football coach at the University of Southern California (USC) from 2001 to 2009 and the head coach of the Seahawks from 2010 to 2023.

Carroll is the third and most recent head coach to win a college football national championship and a Super Bowl along with Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer.

He also won a BCS national championship in 2004, although the title was later vacated.

He was inducted into the charter class of the Redwood High School Athletic Hall of Fame in April 2009.

After high school, Carroll attended junior college at the nearby College of Marin, where he played football for two years (lettering in his second year) before transferring to the University of the Pacific, where he was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.

Carroll's collegiate success prompted an NFL return in 2010 when he was hired as the head coach of Seattle.

In 14 seasons under Carroll, the Seahawks qualified for the playoffs 10 times, clinched their division five times, made two consecutive Super Bowl appearances, and won the franchise's first championship in Super Bowl XLVIII.

The team's Legion of Boom defense also led the league in scoring defense for four consecutive seasons during his tenure.

Following the 2023 season, Carroll stepped down as head coach to take an executive position with the Seahawks.