Alabama is hiring Liberty linebackers coach Robert Bala to serve as the Tide’s inside linebackers coach, according to multiple reports Saturday morning.

Bala would replace Austin Armstrong, who left earlier this week to become Florida’s defensive coordinator, nine days after being announced as Alabama’s inside linebackers coach.

ESPN reported Saturday morning Bala interviewed with Alabama this week and is “expected to take the job in the upcoming days.” ESPN reported later Saturday morning that Bala had already accepted the job.

Bala spent last season as a defensive analyst at Liberty, which was coached by Hugh Freeze before he took the Auburn job. New Flames coach Jamey Chadwell promoted Bala to linebackers coach in December.

Before Liberty, most of Bala’s coaching experience has come on the West Coast. He spent the 2018-21 seasons at Southern Utah, which was a member at the time of the FCS Big Sky Conference.

Bala coached Southern Utah’s cornerbacks in 2018, added co-special teams coordinator duties in 2019, then became defensive coordinator for the 2020 and 2021 seasons, also coaching safeties one year and linebackers the next.

Bala is a native of Oceanside, California who played linebacker for Palomar College in California and later graduated from Southern Utah in 2008. His first two coaching jobs came at Snow College in Utah and Palomar, both community colleges, before he interned for the Oakland Raiders in 2014, then returned to Palomar in 2015. He spent the 2017 season as special teams coordinator for Ottawa University in Arizona.

Alabama’s inside linebackers coach the past five seasons had been Pete Golding, who spent the past four seasons as the Tide’s sole defensive coordinator before leaving for Ole Miss last month.

Mike Rodak is an Alabama beat reporter for Alabama Media Group. Follow him on Twitter @mikerodak.