Bio

Ikeem Allen joined the Defiance football staff in June 2024 after spending five seasons as a player/coach in the professional football ranks overseas.

A defensive lineman while on the field, he spent the 2023 season with the Dresden Monarchs and Potsdam Royals in Germany. He spent the previous two years in Finland with the Kuopio Steelers as a player and defensive line coach. In 2021, he was a league all-star and helped lead Kuopio to the league championship. He was part of a winning team in Australia as well with the Brisbane Rhinos, who fell a point shy of a league title in 2019.

Allen played Division-I football at Miami University, where he was a teammate of Offensive Coordinator Spencer Treadwell during his freshman year. Allen's first year as a Redhawk earned his the team's Defensive Newcomer of the Year Award in 2014. He was a two-time All-MAC performer with Second Team honors as a junior and Third Team during his senior year in 2018. He was a three-time team captain at Miami in addition to being a four-year starter. The Charlotte, N.C. native earned his bachelor's degree in kinesiology and health in 2018. Allen won a state championship with a perfect 17-0 senior season and was North Carolina's Defensive Player of the Year.