Drew Cronic is in his second year at Navy as the offensive coordinator.
In his first year of calling the plays at Navy, Cronic helped lead the Mids to a 10-3 record, wins over Air Force and Army to win the Commander-In-Chief’s Trophy and a victory over Oklahoma to win the Armed Forces Bowl. The 10 wins marked just the sixth time in school history Navy has won 10 or more games in a season.
The win over Oklahoma in the Armed Forces Bowl was the first time Navy has defeated a team from the SEC in a bowl game since 1954 (1955 Sugar Bowl) when the Mids beat Ole Miss 21-0. It was the first win against an SEC team overall since Navy defeated Vanderbilt in 2004.
Navy finished the regular season with a complete domination of Service Academy rival #19 Army, knocking off the Black Knights 31-13 in the 125th playing of the Army-Navy Game presented by USAA. With wins over Air Force and Army, the Mids won the Commander-In-Chief’s Trophy, which is presented annually to the winner of the football competition among the 3 major service academies (Navy, Air Force and Army) and is named in honor of the President of the United States.
Navy won the two Service Academy games in 2024 by a combined 45 points, which ties the 2019 Navy team for the biggest combined CIC blowouts by any of the three Service Academies since 2007 when Navy beat Air Force and Army by a combined 46 points.
Navy’s win over Army gave Navy victories over two ranked opponents for the first time since 1958, when the Mids defeated #8 / #7 Rice 20-7 and #14 / #12 Michigan 20-14. Navy defeated #24 (Coaches) Memphis 56-44 on Sept. 21, 2024.
Navy was predicted to finish 11th in the 2024 American Athletic Conference preseason poll and ended the year tied for third with Memphis (Navy beat Memphis head-to-head) with a 6-2 mark.
Offensive linemen Connor McMahon (Sr. / OT) and Ben Purvis (Jr. / OG) were named honorable mention all-conference.
The Navy offense scored 407 points in its 13 games in 2024, which was a whopping 195 more than it scored in its 12 games in 2023.
Navy averaged 247.5 rushing yards per game in 2024, the sixth-best average in the FBS and the program’s best since 2019.
The Mids finished 37 of 42 (.881) in the red zone with 34 (.810) of those scores resulting in touchdowns. Navy finished #1 in the country in red zone touchdown percentage.
Eli Heidenreich’s (Jr. / SB) six touchdown receptions tied for Navy’s single-season touchdown catches record. Heidenreich closed out the year being named a Third-Team All-American by College Football Network.
Blake Horvath (Jr. / QB) threw a school-record tying 13 touchdown passes in 2024. Horvath accounted for four touchdowns in Navy’s 31-13 victory over Army, rushing for 196 yards and two TDs on 24 carries, while throwing for 107 yards and two TDs. He scored the game-tying touchdown against Oklahoma on a school-record 95-yard touchdown run and then gave Navy the lead on a six-yard scoring run with 4:34 remaining.
Horvath, with 1,246 yards rushing, is the first Navy player to rush for 1,000 yards in a season since 2019 when Malcolm Perry rushed for 2,017 yards. He is the first Navy quarterback to surpass 1,000 passing yards in a season since 2019 when Malcolm Perry threw for 1,084 yards.
Horvath’s 1,353 passing yards are the most by a Navy player since Will Worth threw for 1,397 yards in 2016. Additionally, he is the 3rd quarterback in school history to rush AND pass for more than 1,200 yards in the same season, joining Keenan Reynolds in 2015 (1,203 pass, 1,373 rush) and Chris McCoy in 1997 (1,203 pass, 1,370 rush).
Cronic came to Navy from Mercer, where he put together a 28-17 (.622) record over the last four years, including a 22-10 (.688) mark in the rugged Southern Conference.
A native of Sharpsburg, Georgia, Cronic is considered one of the more innovative offensive minds across all levels of college football. Driven by the motto “Raise the Bar,” Cronic has been a head coach for a combined eight years at three different schools and has compiled a career record of 75-23 (.765) while also handling offensive coordinator duties that featured variations of the option offense.
Cronic led Mercer to an historic 9-4 record in 2023, including a 6-2 mark in the Southern Conference. The nine wins are the most against Division I opponents in the 50-year history of the program, while the team earned an FCS playoff berth for the first time in school history. The 6-2 conference mark tied Cronic’s 2021 team for the most Southern Conference wins in school history.
The Bears defeated Gardner-Webb 17-7 in the first round of the FCS playoffs before falling to eventual National Champion South Dakota State in the second round. Mercer finished the year ranked No. 20 in the AFCA Coaches Poll, one of three Southern Conference teams that were ranked in the final poll.
In 2022, Mercer (7-4, 5-3 SoCon) reached its highest AFCA FCS Coaches Poll ranking in school history at No. 11 thanks to its most explosive and potent offense in program history, as the Bears averaged 38.2 points per game.
In 2021, Mercer finished 7-3 and 6-2 in the conference, losing to East Tennessee State 38-35 in the final regular-season game of the year that determined the Southern Conference champion. Mercer finished the season ranked No. 21 in the STATS Perform Poll while averaging 31.7 points per game.
Cronic’s first season at Mercer was supposed to be in the fall of 2020, but was pushed to the spring of 2021 due to COVID. Cronic led the Bears to their best Southern Conference season since joining the conference with five league wins, including three over ranked foes. Cronic’s squad defeated No. 9 Chattanooga (35-28), No. 17 Furman (26-14) and No. 20 East Tennessee State (21-13) over three-consecutive weeks.
Cronic engineered one of the most impressive turnarounds in college football at Lenoir-Rhyne, taking a team that went 3-8 the year before he got there to a 25-3 record over his two seasons at the helm (12-2 in 2018 and 13-1 in 2019).
Cronic was named the AFCA National Coach of the Year in 2018, as he led the Bears to the sixth-best turnaround in Division II history and past the first round of the Division II playoffs for just the second time in school history.
Cronic was the offensive coordinator at Furman in 2017, as his offense led the Paladins to the second round of the FCS playoffs, averaging 34 points per game.
Before his stint at Furman, Cronic coached at Reinhardt from 2012-16 and was instrumental in the startup of the program. For the first-three seasons, Cronic served as assistant head coach, offensive coordinator, quarterbacks coach and recruiting coordinator for the Eagles before being named the head coach prior to the 2015 campaign.
Cronic directed Reinhardt to a nine-win season in 2015 before a record-breaking year in 2016, as the Eagles went 13-1, won the Mid-South Conference Championship and advanced to the NAIA National Quarterfinals. Reinhardt averaged 51.1 points per contest and totaled 550.6 yards of offense per game, ranking first in the nation in both categories.
The Eagles led the nation in rushing offense (360.0 ypg) and rushing touchdowns (71), while having the nation’s second-highest passing efficiency (178.0) to go along with 25 touchdown passes.
Cronic was twice named the Mid-South Conference West Division Coach of the Year and the AFCA NAIA Region I Coach of the Year.
Cronic’s first stint at Furman lasted nine years (2002-10) as he served in several coaching roles including wide receivers, running backs, tight ends and recruiting coordinator. During his time there, the Paladins won a Southern Conference title in 2004 and put together an 11-3 season in 2005, which ended with a trip to the national semifinals.
In 1999, Cronic began his coaching career after graduate school at James Madison where he served three seasons as receivers coach and assistant recruiting coordinator. The Dukes won the Atlantic 10 Championship in his first year and earned a bid to the FCS Playoffs
Cronic played quarterback for his father, Danny Cronic, at East Coweta High School before playing collegiately at Georgia. As a Bulldog, Cronic played wide receiver and was a member of the special teams, lettering twice and participating in the 1995 Peach Bowl and 1997 Outback Bowl.
Cronic received his bachelor’s degree in mathematics education from the University of Georgia in 1998 before earning his master’s degree in educational leadership in 1999 from the University of West Georgia.
Cronic and his wife, Amelia, have three sons, Noah, Elijah and Isaiah. Elijah is a freshman at the Naval Academy and a member of the football team.
