Feb 21, 2023 3 min read

For as long as he can remember, Tyler Aeschbacher dreamed of being a head football coach.

Tuesday night, the dream came true as he was hired to take over the Charleroi High School program.

“I have always had a great amount of respect for the Charleroi program,” he said. “They have had tough teams and great facilities.

“It is a place where I feel that I will be supported, and from (superintendent) Dr. (Ed) Zelich to the others I met with, they are a great group of people.”

A Carmichaels native, Aeschbacher played at Waynesburg University and earned a bachelor’s degree in Biology in 2018. In 2021, he graduated from Illinois State University with a Master’s in Psychology of Sport.

While working on his undergraduate degree, Aeschbacher began his coaching career as he served as the offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach at Carmichaels.

Next, he was the tight ends coach at Adams State University from May 2018 through February 2020.

Aeschbacher left Adams State for Illinois Wesleyan University and was its wide receivers coach, special teams coordinator and video coordinator from February 2020 through December 2021.

Zelich spoke about why Aeschbacher stood out from the other 27 candidates who applied for the position.

“There were many highly qualified candidates that we interviewed,” Zelich said. “Tyler’s high school and collegiate coaching experiences will truly benefit our student-athletes.”

Aeschbacher succeeds Marc Gambino, who was the Cougars’ coach for only one season. Charleroi went 1-5 in the Class 2A Century Conference and 2-7 overall.

Charleroi athletic director Ashley Abbott was impressed by Aeschbacher during the interview process.

“He asked to look at our Hudl (videos) prior to his interview to check out our team and systems,” she said. “He was big on creating a positive and welcoming environment and mentioned not only creating a strong football team but strong young men.

“He was genuine and enthusiastic, and he will be a great asset to our community and our football program.”

Aeschbacher will hit the ground running.

“The first step will be meet with the scholar-athletes,” he said. “I want to get the weight room going, put a staff together and figure out who will coach were.”

While Aeschbacher has always wanted to be a coach, it was a video game that really put the thought in motion.

“EA Sports had a game titled NFL Head Coach,” he said of the game which was initially released in 2006 and a sequel came out in 2009. “That game really got me thinking in depth.”

Officially with his own program to run, Aeschbacher will look to turn things around at Charleroi.

After a brief resurgence for the program from 2017-19 that saw the team reach the playoffs three straight seasons, including a run to the WPIAL Class AA semifinals in 2018, the Cougars have gone a combined 6-19 the last three seasons.