Indiana Football Hires Veteran Strength Coach Tyson Brown to Lead Athletic Performance Program
Indiana football made a key addition to its staff, naming Tyson Brown as the program’s new Director of Athletic Performance. Head coach Curt Cignetti announced the hire Friday, bringing in a seasoned strength and conditioning coach with a proven track record of building physically dominant teams across multiple programs.
Brown arrives in Bloomington after a strong two-year run at UConn, where he served as the head strength and conditioning coach. During his time in Storrs, he played a major role in one of the most successful stretches in recent program history. The Huskies posted back-to-back bowl appearances, including consecutive trips to the Fenway Bowl, and notched 18 wins across the 2024 and 2025 seasons - a high-water mark for the program in recent years.
Before his time at UConn, Brown spent four seasons leading the strength and conditioning program at Mississippi State from 2020 to 2024. That tenure saw the Bulldogs earn three straight bowl trips from 2020 to 2022, going 2-1 in those games.
Under Mike Leach in 2021, Mississippi State won nine games - the program’s best mark since 2014. Brown’s work in Starkville helped lay the physical foundation for a team that thrived in one of the most demanding conferences in the country.
Brown is no stranger to the Pac-12 either. He logged six years at Washington State, including two as the head of the strength and conditioning program (2018-19) and four as an assistant (2014-17) under respected strength coach Jason Loscalzo.
During that stretch, the Cougars made five straight bowl appearances and racked up 46 wins, consistently finishing near the top of the Pac-12 North. His time in Pullman overlapped with Mike Leach’s run there as well, giving Brown valuable experience working alongside one of college football’s most unique minds.
Interestingly, Brown was nearly reunited with Curt Cignetti back in 2017 when he was briefly hired at Elon. But when Loscalzo left for the NFL, Brown stayed at Washington State to take over the Cougars’ strength program. Now, nearly a decade later, he and Cignetti finally join forces in Bloomington.
Brown’s coaching journey has taken him through a number of programs and levels. He served as associate director of strength and conditioning at USF in 2013, and before that, spent two seasons as an assistant at Washington. He also held internships and graduate assistant roles with the Houston Texans, Baylor, and his alma mater, Sioux Falls.
A native of Bothell, Washington, Brown played his college ball at Sioux Falls, where he helped the Cougars win the 2006 NAIA National Championship as a player and returned as a strength coach for their 2008 title run. He holds a bachelor’s degree in exercise science and a master’s from California University of Pennsylvania. He’s also a Certified Strength & Conditioning Specialist (CSCS) and is certified by USA Weightlifting.
Brown brings not just credentials, but a clear history of helping programs take the next step physically. He’s been part of championship teams, bowl teams, and rebuilds - and now, he’s tasked with bringing that same edge to Indiana as the Hoosiers begin a new chapter under Cignetti.
Brown and his wife, Kinzie, have three children: son Brody and daughters Bella and Briar.