‘One of the Best Men I Have Ever Known’: Remembering Former Michigan Assistant Coach Mike DeBord

The University of Michigan is grieving the loss of its former offensive coordinator and offensive line coach Mike DeBord. DeBord, 69, died on Tuesday, April 15, from complications due to a stroke he experienced in 2021.

Originally from Muncie, Indiana, DeBord became an offensive line coach at Manchester College, where he served as a captain in 1977. He began his coaching career in 1982.

DeBord made coaching stops at Ball State, Colorado State, Eastern Illinois, and Northwestern before joining Lloyd Carr's Michigan staff. DeBord was the Wolverines' offensive line coach from 1993 to 1996 before becoming the offensive coordinator in 1997. There, he helped direct the Michigan football program to achieve an unbeaten season and earned the AP national championship in 1999.

DeBord left Michigan to become head coach of Central Michigan from 2000 to 2003. He returned to Michigan in 2004 and was a member of Michigan's football staff until 2007 when Carr retired.

After Carr retired, DeBord coached in the NFL at Seattle and Chicago. In 2013, he returned to Michigan as sports administrator for Michigan's Olympic teams. DeBord returned to college coaching at Tennessee in 2015 and Indiana in 2017, where he was associate head coach and offensive coordinator. 

Jon Jansen was a two-time Michigan captain and was an essential member of the university's national title team. DeBord and Jansen grew close during his coaching career at Michigan.

“Mike was one of the great leaders,” Jansen told The Detroit News in an interview on Tuesday, April 15. “He cared about you as a player and 100% attribute a ton of my success and my life to the energy he put into me. He was just like everybody on Lloyd's staff — he was such a good man and cared about you as an individual, whether it was going to class, making the right decisions. He was somebody that was always there no matter the situation. He was one of the best men I have ever known.”