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First-year coach Brad Childress on Thursday filled the most high-profile position on the Minnesota Vikings' coaching staff, hiring Green Bay Packers quarterbacks coach Darrell Bevell as his offensive coordinator.

Bevell, 36, was the starting quarterback at the University of Wisconsin during a part of Childress' tenure with the Badgers in the early 1990s. The two developed a close working relationship, as Childress was quarterbacks coach and offensive coordinator at the time.

Childress on Tuesday had hired Tampa Bay secondary coach Mike Tomlin as defensive coordinator.

It has long been rumored Bevell might join Childress if the latter ever landed an NFL head coach job. The Vikings received permission from Green Bay officials earlier this week to interview Bevell for the coordinator post.

In taking over the Vikings offense, Bevell inherits a unit that possesses some explosive playmakers, but was inconsistent in 2005. One big question hanging over the offense is the health of quarterback Daunte Culpepper, who faces a long rehabilitation from the catastrophic knee injury he sustained during the season. Given the backgrounds of both Childress and Bevell, the offense is likely to be a West Coast style.

Bevell served six seasons on the Green Bay staff, the past three as quarterbacks coach. He joined Mike Sherman's staff in 2000 after serving as an assistant on college staffs at Westmar (1996), Iowa State (1997) and Connecticut (1998-99).

In addition to hiring Bevell, Childress filled two other positions on his offensive staff. He hired Kevin Rogers, who spent the past four seasons on the Virginia Tech staff, as his quarterbacks coach. Former Oklahoma receivers coach Darrell Wyatt was hired to work with the Minnesota receivers. Former NFL tailback Eric Bieniemy, currently on the staff at UCLA, is close to an agreement to become Childress' running backs assistant.

Len Pasquarelli is a senior NFL writer for ESPN.com. To check out Len's chat archive, click here .