Joe Bernardi, whose well-traveled college coaching career includes stops in the Pac-12, Southeastern Conference and, most recently at the collegiate level San Jose State, now is headed back to the SEC, sources tell FootballScoop.
Bernardi, a second-generation coach whose father Gary spent more than four decades in college coaching, is joining the Auburn University staff of Bryan Harsin as an offensive analysts, per sources to FootballScoop Tuesday night.
He is set to work with the Tigers' offensive line, sources indicated.
A former Fresno State player who broke into coaching at the University of Tennessee in 2011-12 and then spent three seasons on the Oregon Ducks’ staff, Bernardi returned to his alma mater in 2016 to work with the Bulldogs’ tight ends.
Bernardi then spent multiple seasons at San Jose State as the Spartans’ offensive line coach, adding running game coordinator duties along the way.
He briefly had gotten out of collegiate coaching, going to the Immanuel School (California) as the private, Christian-based school’s athletics director in early 2021.
It’s a second consecutive offensive analyst move for Harsin that brings back someone with SEC ties to the Tigers’ staff; last week, FootballScoop first reported that former University of Kentucky All-SEC quarterback Brian Hartline was joining the Auburn staff in a senior offensive analyst position.