Western Carolina University

A three-year defensive starter at Georgia Southern University, Ty Phillips joined the Catamount football coaching staff in the spring of 2026, coaching the bandits or defensive ends. He came to Cullowhee after two years on staff at Georgia Military College.
 
Phillips served as the defensive line coach and defensive run-game coordinator in his two seasons at GMC, earning the title of recruiting coordinator prior to making the move to Cullowhee. Georgia Military won 20 games over the two seasons with Phillips on staff and finished ranked third in 2024 and fifth in 2025 in the final National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) polls.
 
GMC finished among the national leaders in rush defense in 2025, adding 103 tackles for loss with 48 sacks, ranked fifth nationally. The 2024 defense had 104 TFLs, including 43 sacks – the second-most in the NJCAA.
 
Under Phillips, 25 players at GMC earned scholarships to four-year institutions to continue their football careers, including 17 in 2025 and eight in 2024. A total of 13 of those student-athletes landed at NCAA Division I programs.
 
Phillips earned his coaching start at McDonough High School in McDonough, Ga., in the summer of 2023.
 
Before transitioning into coaching, Phillips was a standout nose tackle at Georgia Southern from 2016-20, parlaying an accomplished high school career at Colquitt County High, where he was a first-team All-Region selection and a back-to-back state champion, to the collegiate level. A three-year starter, he amassed 99 career tackles, including 35 solo stops and 17 for loss with six sacks during his playing career. Phillips was a 2018 All-Sun Belt Conference honorable mention after recording a career-high 36 tackles and was a 2019 team captain.
 
Originally from Moultrie, Ga., Phillips earned his Bachelor of Interdisciplinary Studies from Georgia Southern, majoring in coaching and psychology, while minoring in business.