Lafayette Extends Head Coach John Troxell's Contract Through 2031

John Troxell guided Lafayette to its first Patriot League championship in a decade during his second season on the job. Now Lafayette College athletics has locked him in for five more years, signing the Fred M. Kirby II '42 Head Football Coach to a contract extension through the 2031 season.

The announcement, made March 17 from Easton, Pa., caps a turnaround that began when Troxell was hired in December 2021. His 2023 squad went nine games, the program's most wins in more than 40 years, while capturing that Patriot League title. The Maroon and White ranked as high as No. 16 in the FCS Top-25 metrics that season before climbing to No. 14 in 2024. Troxell earned Patriot League Coach of the Year honors after 2023 and was a finalist for the Eddie Robinson National Coach of the Year Award.

"Coach Troxell has consistently raised the bar since taking over our football program four years ago," said Lafayette Director of Athletics Sherryta Freeman. "He has rallied our alumni base and rejuvenated our program by bringing in a talented staff which has recruited and developed some of the best student-athletes in the country. Trox has helped guide us to new heights, while exhibiting all of the qualities that a leader of young men should possess. We're excited to have him leading our program on College Hill for the foreseeable future."

Troxell arrived at Lafayette with a well-documented record of rebuilding programs. He spent 16 years as head coach at Franklin and Marshall College, where he inherited a program that had managed just one winning season in the 13 campaigns before his arrival in 2006. Four years into a full recruiting cycle, the Diplomats finished 9-2, and the program subsequently reached the postseason nine times during his tenure.

The connection to College Hill runs deeper than his coaching record. Troxell played at Lafayette from 1990 to 1994, earning a bachelor's degree in government and law. He was the starting free safety on the Leopards' 1992 Patriot League Championship team and received the Unsung Hero Award as a senior before completing a master's degree in sociology and education in 1997 while on staff at Columbia.

"I would like to thank President Hurd and Sherryta Freeman for their belief in our vision as we continue to partner together to raise Lafayette Football to new heights," Troxell said. "I am so grateful and humbled to be able to coach incredible student athletes and to lead a program that has such a storied past and a future with endless possibilities."

With the extension now in place through 2031, Troxell enters his fifth season at the helm of a program that has gone from rebuilding to ranked in the span of three years.