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Football
- Title:
- Special Teams Coordinator & Defensive Backs
- Email:
- ejackson@princeton.edu
Eric Jackson enters his 10th season coaching the defensive backs at Princeton. He oversaw the development of first-team All-America selection Jay McCareins in 2005. A three-time All-Ivy selection during his career, McCareins led the nation in interceptions that season, earned National Defensive Player of the Week honors after recording three interceptions in a game and went on to sign a free-agent deal with the Arizona Cardinals in the offseason.
Jackson coached a pair of first-team All-Ivy selections during the Ivy League championship season of 2006 in Tim Strickland, who started every game of his career, and J.J. Artis. Both were named Ivy League Defensive Player of the Week after multiple-interception games last season. The 2006 passing defense was ranked second in the Ivy League, allowing only 185.2 yards per game. In 2002, prior to the arrival of Artis and Strickland, all four of Jackson’s starters earned All-Ivy recognition.
Jackson will guide both experience and youth in the 2009 season. While seniors Cart Kelly, Dan Kopolovich and Wilson Cates all bring significant starting experience into the season, sophomores Blake Clemons, Trevor Wilkins and Matt Wakulchik are among the several exciting underclassmen who will be looking to make a positive impact in the backfield.
Jackson has also worked with the Princeton special teams throughout his tenure and helped Greg Fields become one of the top all-purpose players in the nation in 2004. Both Fields and McCareins were also critical in the return game.
Jackson played at Eastern Michigan in the mid-’80s before turning to coaching after graduation in 1987. His first job was at the high school from which he graduated, Ypsilanti High School near Ann Arbor, Mich.
He moved to the college level, first at Cincinnati from 1987-88 and then at Cornell, where he helped the Big Red to the 1990 Ivy League title. He served as secondary coach at Idaho in 1993, when the Vandals advanced to the Division I-AA semifinals before losing to eventual champion Youngstown State.
Jackson has had coaching internships with the Detroit Lions and Carolina Panthers, and he spent three seasons as the defensive coordinator at Cal Poly. He rejoined the staff at Cornell for one year before moving cross-town to Ithaca.
Jackson has a son Davis and a daughter Brooks.
RECRUITING AREAS
Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Oregon, Washington, Wisconsin
