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Daniel Christopher Rocco (born July 16, 1960) 1995 University of Texas Football Media Guide p. 94 is an American football coach. He is a senior offensive analyst for the Virginia Tech Hokies. Rocco served as the head football coach at Liberty University from 2006 to 2011, the University of Richmond from 2012 to 2015, the University of Delaware from 2017 to 2021, and the Virginia Military Institute from 2023 to 2025. He was assistant coach for the New York Jets of the National Football League (NFL) in 2000. Rocco played college football as a linebacker, first at Pennsylvania State University before transferring to Wake Forest University.
Rocco earned his bachelor's degree in speech communication from Wake Forest University in 1984. He added an education and counseling master's degree from Wake Forest in 1987.
Rocco began his coaching career as a graduate assistant then defensive line coach at Wake Forest, from 1984 to 1986. After a season coaching linebackers at the University of Colorado at Boulder under Bill McCartney, he spent three seasons at the University of Tulsa. Next stop for Rocco was Boston College for three years under Tom Coughlin as defensive line coach.
In his first season as head coach at Liberty in 2006, he led the Flames to a 6–5 record and was honored by the Big South Conference as their Coach of the Year. He then followed that up in 2007 by leading the Flames to an 8–3 record and the school's first Big South Conference championship and his second consecutive Coach of the Year honors.
In February 2008, the university extended Rocco's contract through the 2012 season. He then followed that up with another Big South championship in 2008 with a 5–0 record in league play. He was named Big South Coach of the Year for the third straight season.
In 2009, Rocco stretched the Flames' Big South winning streak to a conference-record 15 games before falling in the season finale at Stony Brook. Liberty shared the conference championship with the Seawolves. In 2010, a loss at Coastal Carolina led to a three-way share of the league title with the Chanticleers and Stony Brook. But CCU went to the playoffs based on a tie-breaker of points allowed in conference games.
In January 2010, Rocco signed a two-year contract extension through the 2014 season.
On December 6, 2011, Rocco was named head coach at the University of Richmond.
On December 13, 2016, Rocco was named head coach at the University of Delaware. Rocco coached Delaware to a 31-23 record over five seasons. He was fired after a disappointing 2021 campaign that saw his team finish 5–6.
After spending the 2022 season as an analyst for James Franklin and Penn State, Rocco was named the new head coach at VMI, replacing Scott Wachenheim.
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