Andrew Aurich, who is the fifth person to lead the Crimson since Ivy League play began in football in 1956, begins his second season in 2025 as The Thomas Stephenson Family Head Coach for Harvard Football.
In Year 1 at the helm of the program, Aurich led Harvard to its second straight Ivy League title after a 2024 campaign that saw it finish 8-2 and 5-2 in conference play. At one point of the season, the Crimson won seven straight games and entered both major top-25 polls, rising to as high as No. 17 in the Stats Perform rankings before finishing 2024 at No. 25. Under Aurich's leadership, wide receiver Cooper Barkate and safety Ty Bartrum earned a trip to New York City as finalists for the Asa S. Bushnell Cup, which recognizes the Ivy League Offensive and Defensive Players of the Year. The duo was also part of the Crimson's 17 all-Ivy League honorees, a figure that led the Ancient Eight, with Barkate later earning All-America accolades from five different media outlets.
Prior to stepping foot in Cambridge, the St. Paul, Minnesota, native gained valuable coaching experience having spent time at the high-school, NCAA Division III, NCAA Division I (FCS, FBS) and NFL levels. His stops included tours at Rutgers and Princeton, and with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Aurich arrived at Harvard from Rutgers and the Big Ten Conference where he spent six seasons, covering two stints (2009-10, 2020-23). In his first go-around, Aurich was involved in player development (2009), before serving as a defensive assistant in 2010. During his most recent stay in Piscataway, New Jersey, Aurich helped build the Scarlet Knights, who won two games the season before his arrival, into an outfit that won seven games in 2023, and defeated Miami (Fla.) in the Bad Boy Mowers Pinstripe Bowl.
Aurich coached the Rutgers offensive line from 2020-21, and his impact was immediately felt. In 2020, the Scarlet Knights finished as the nation’s fourth-most improved scoring offense team (+13.4 ppg) and had the sixth-best improvement in total points scored among FBS schools despite playing three fewer games than many of its peers. A season later, the offensive line helped Rutgers post its highest win total since 2014. The last two years, meanwhile, saw Aurich coach the running backs (2022) and tight ends (2023) to a position of strength, with Rutgers boasting a top-10 true first-year running back in 2022, and a 2023 All-Big Ten Honorable Mention tight end.
Before helping the Scarlet Knights return to bowl eligibility, Aurich enjoyed a successful eight-season tenure at Princeton (2011, 2013-19). In Year 1, the running backs coach mentored the first first-year in Ivy League history to rush for more than 1,000 yards in a season. After one year in the Ancient Eight, Aurich spent the 2012 campaign in the NFL with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as a defensive assistant, before returning to Princeton in 2013 to coach the Tigers’ tight ends and special teams (2013-15).
Aurich took on recruiting coordinator duties and moved to the offensive line for 2016. His move to the trenches helped jumpstart a group that produced the Ivy League’s top scoring and rushing units en route to Princeton’s first conference title since ’13. The success prompted another title change as Aurich was promoted to associate head coach ahead of the 2017 season. Over the next two years (2017-18), Princeton ranked among the top 15 nationally in fewest tackles-for-loss allowed and fewest sacks allowed, with the 2018 offense ranking among the most prolific in the country. That year, the Tigers led the Ivy in rushing, while leading the FCS in scoring (all-time Ivy record 47.0 ppg) en route to a 10-0 campaign and league championship. Following Princeton’s second Ivy crown in three years, Aurich was elevated to offensive coordinator/offensive line coach for 2019, directing one of the Ivy League’s top offensive attacks before heading to Rutgers in ’20.
Aurich began his collegiate coaching career at Albright College, a Division III school in Reading, Pennsylvania. While serving as Albright’s tight ends coach and recruiting coordinator, Aurich helped the Lions to a 5-win improvement over the previous season in his first year, going from two wins in 2006 to seven in ’07. In 2008, Aurich guided Albright to a Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) championship, its first since 1997.
Aurich, who began his coaching journey in 2006 at his high school alma mater, Concordia Academy, played collegiately at Princeton as an offensive lineman. During his time in the orange and black, Aurich helped the Tigers go from two wins his sophomore season to five a year later, before the team was victorious seven times his senior campaign. The seven wins in 2005 were the most by a Princeton team since ‘95. Aurich later graduated from the school in the spring of 2006.
Aurich and his wife, Michelle, have a daughter, Aria, and two sons, Axel and Ace.
THE ANDREW AURICH FILE
HARVARD CRIMSON
2024 – head coach
RUTGERS SCARLET KNIGHTS
2023 – tight ends
2022 – running backs
2021 – offensive line
2020 – offensive line
PRINCETON TIGERS
2019 – associate head coach, offensive coordinator, offensive line
2018 – associate head coach, offensive line, recruiting coordinator
2017 – associate head coach, offensive line, recruiting coordinator
2016 – offensive line, recruiting coordinator
2015 – tight ends, special teams
2014 – tight ends, special teams
2013 – tight ends, special teams
TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS
2012 – defensive assistant
PRINCETON TIGERS
2011 – running backs
RUTGERS SCARLET KNIGHTS
2010 – defensive assistant
2009 – player development
ALBRIGHT COLLEGE LIONS
2008 – tight ends, assistant recruiting coordinator
2007 – tight ends, assistant recruiting coordinator
CONCORDIA ACADEMY BEACONS
2006 – varsity assistant coach
