Greg Forest

A staple of Brian Kelly[apos]s football program has been Greg Forest, who continues his 19-year relationship with the head coach as quarterbacks coach at Cincinnati.

Forest has been instrumental in the development of second-team all-BIG EAST quarterback Tony Pike, who was one of five signal callers the Beracats called upon during their 2008 BIG EAST Championship season.

UC broke the school record for pass completions a year ago, with 290, surpassing the previous mark of 286 set in 2006. The Bearcats offense also had 472 pass attempts a year ago, ranking second in UC history.

In 2007, he mentored the UC quarterbacks to a school-record 36 touchdown passes. Graduate quarterback Ben Mauk was the centerpiece of Forest[apos]s tutelage, as he set the school mark in passing touchdowns (31), a total which placed second in the all-time BIG EAST record books. Mauk also finished in the top five in school annals in pass efficiency (150.64), completions (235), attempts (386) and yards (3,121) in his only season under Forest[apos]s watch.

Forest spent the 2006 campaign wearing the tag of assistant head coach to Kelly along with tight ends coach. He served three seasons at Central Michigan spending one season each instructing the receivers, running backs, and tight ends.

Forest worked primarily with the Chippewa running backs in 2005, molding freshman Ontario Sneed into a 1,000-yard rusher. Sneed went on to earn honorable mention all-Mid-American Conference and freshman all-America status from Sporting News and Rivals.com.

A native of Columbus, Ohio, Forest coached wide receivers for 11 years at Grand Valley State, mentoring the top five receivers in GVSU history, including the Lakers[apos] all-time leading receiver David Kircus who went on to play in the NFL. Three of his players garnered all-America recognition.

A 1992 graduate of Ohio Northern University, Forest prepped at Grandview Heights High School (1982). He was a defensive back in football and also competed in wrestling and baseball.

He began his coaching career at Grandview Heights and, after four seasons, Forest went on to be a student assistant at Ohio Northern.

Forest first went to Grand Valley State in 1991 as a sports management intern and then served as an assistant coach at Capital University in 1992 before returning to GVSU in 1993. During his tenure at Grand Valley State, the Lakers qualified for the Division II Playoffs six times and won national championships in 2002 and 2003.