Swanstrom Announces Five Additions to Staff

ITHACA, N.Y. – The Roger J. Weiss `61 Head Coach of Cornell Football, Dan Swanstrom, has added five new coaches to the staff as the team begins its preparations for spring ball. Though newcomers to the Big Red staff and Cornell community, Coach Swanstrom has recruited seasoned veterans with experience from many levels of the game, including across the FCS, the Ivy League, and Division II and III.

The 2023 ECAC Scotty Whitelaw Bowl Champion, two-time Liberty League Champions, and coach of one of the nation’s top Division III defenses, Jeff Dittman joins the Big Red following five seasons at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute as the team’s Defensive and Recruiting Coordinator. For the two seasons prior, Dittman served as the special teams coordinator. He is set to be Cornell’s special teams coordinator and defensive assistant coach.

During the 2023 season, Dittman commanded one of the top defenses in the Liberty League, which allowed just 15.5 points per game, the 22nd fewest points allowed in all of Division III. His defense ranked third in the Liberty League, allowing 304.2 yards per game. The defensive prowess helped the Engineers to an 8-3 record, including two shutouts.

Prior to his second stint at RPI, Dittman served as the special teams coordinator for the 2015 season and director of football operations from 2013-2015.

On the opposite side of the ball from Coach Swanstrom at the University of Pennsylvania, Eric Franklin comes to East Hill as Cornell’s Defensive Backs and Cornerbacks Coach/Pass Game Coordinator after serving as the Quakers’ cornerbacks coach. Penn tallied the FCS’s 11th-best defense in the country, allowing 304 yards per game. In his three seasons with the Quakers, he developed two All-Ivy cornerbacks.

Before joining Penn, Franklin coached the linebackers and served as the special teams coordinator at Washington & Lee University from 2018-2020. He developed three All-ODAC players, two of whom received all-league honors twice in their careers.

Franklin is a graduate of the University of Maryland, where he earned a varsity letter all four years playing safety for the Terrapins.

Making a cross-town move, Mike Hatcher joins the Big Red from South Hill, where he served as the Associate Head Coach for Ithaca College. This marks the second time Hatcher joins a Swanstrom-run team, as Swanstrom also hired Hatcher during his time with the Bombers. In addition to being named the Associate Head Coach at the conclusion of the 2021 season at IC, Hatcher was also the team’s offensive coordinator along with coaching quarterbacks and wide receivers. He will coach the wide receivers for the Big Red.

In his time with the Bombers, Hatcher was a two-time NCAA DIII Tournament qualifier including an Elite Eight run in 2022. The team was named Liberty League Champions three of the four years he coached at Ithaca. He coached the 2022 Liberty League Offensive Player of the Year, A.J. Wingfield, who went on to become a semi-finalist for the Gagliardi Trophy for the Division III national Player of the year award.

Before South Hill, Hatcher was the offensive coordinator, quarterbacks coach, and recruiting coordinator at Misericordia University from 2012-2020.

Entering his second consecutive season, and seventh overall, alongside Coach Swanstrom, Sean Reeder joins Cornell from the University of Pennsylvania where he served as tight ends coach. He will join the Cornell staff as the offensive line coach.

At Penn, Reeder generated the highest offensive yards gained total in the Ivy League in 2023. Under Hatcher, Penn’s No. 1 tight end led the conference in catches and yards in his position.

Before joining the Quakers, Reeder coached at Ithaca College under Swanstrom from 2017-21 and continued as an offensive coordinator with the Bombers through the 2022 season.

Terry Ursin rounds out the core of coaches joining the 2024 football staff. Set to serve as the Big Red’s running backs coach, Ursin joins the staff following a teaching and coaching stint at Jesuit High School of New Orleans, where he has taught since 2015.

The Swanstrom and Ursin ties go back to the head coach’s playing days. Ursin coached in a multitude of roles while Swanstrom played at Rhodes College, including special teams coordinator and defensive backs coach during the 2005 season when Swanstrom was named a Gagliardi finalist. He also served as the team’s strength and conditioning coach.

Between Rhodes and becoming a teacher, Ursin served as the defensive coordinator at Holmes Community College and La Grange College.

In tandem with the five newcomers, Coach Swanstrom has moved Andrew Dees to tight ends coach and Will Blanden to safeties coach. They join Associate Head Coach Jared Backus, who returns as The John B. and Ann M. Rogers `45 Defensive Coordinator and linebackers coach and Satyen Bhakta is back as the defensive line coach and recruiting coordinator.

The new staff gets its first action on Saturday, September 21 when it travels to Colgate to take on the Raiders in the 105th meeting between the upstate rivals.