Jeff Schmedding had established himself as a defensive coordinator at Boise State.

But when Bryan Harsin was hired at Auburn, he wanted to follow him, even if it meant a demotion to inside linebackers coach.

Now, obviously, there was no guarantee that the new staff at Boise State would elect to keep Schmedding, but it didn’t matter for him. He wanted to stick with his guy.

“Yeah, when this all happened it happens very fast like it always does in this business,” Schmedding said. “I have been at a couple of places and ultimately the ability to compete in the SEC at the highest levels surely plays into it, but to do this job where you are 90 hours a week a lot of times and away from your family, which family is very important to me, you have got to go, in my opinion, to work for somebody that you believe what their vision is.

“Being able to be the defensive coordinator at Boise State and seeing the vision, how he carries himself and what he wants in his program, how that gets implemented and then the family atmosphere that it brings, for me it was a no-brainer. In that sense you are going to the most competitive league in college football and you are working for somebody you believe in. It is a slam dunk.”

Schmedding is not the only former Boise assistant to follow Harsin to Auburn, either.

The former Boise State offensive coordinator, Eric Kiesau, joined Harsin’s support staff as an offensive analyst.

Jeff Pitman was the strength and conditioning coach at Boise and holds the same role at Auburn.

And tight ends coach Brad Bedell was willing to go from coaching the offensive line at Boise to coaching the tight ends at Auburn.

“The other thing is I think with coach Harsin's success is that the X's and O's are vital. We understand that, but your culture in your football team is really what's going to help develop the X's and O's,” Bedell said. “When you develop a culture in a football team and things like that and the way coach Harsin does it is what really can gel a team together. And that's the one thing that I respect about coach Harsin in that he's a phenomenal person when building a team culture and things like that.”

Harsin and the former Boise assistant will have their first chance to show off what they’ve worked on at Auburn on Saturday during the A-Day game at 1 p.m. CST. The game is available on ESPN+.

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