Tennessee hires Florida's Chuck Jeroloman as top assistant under Josh Elander

Tennessee has hired Florida interim head coach and top assistant Chuck Jeroloman to Josh Elander’s inaugural staff, per D1 Baseball’s Kendall Rogers. Jeroloman is set to become the top assistant and recruiting coordinator for the Volunteers.

Jeroloman, who was serving as Florida’s interim head coach with Kevin O’Sullivan away from the team, finished his sixth season with the Gators during the 2025 season, helping them reach the NCAA Tournament in each of those years. That included consecutive appearances in the College World Series, and he was promoted to associate head coach during the 2025 offseason.

The two have ties going back over a decade. Jeroloman was a volunteer assistant coach at TCU during Elander’s playing days.

This past season, Jeroloman helped lead the Gators offense to 94 home runs — the seventh-highest total in program history. Florida fought injuries throughout the season, and Jeroloman helped the Gators navigate through this tough time by putting 11 different players in position to score walk-off or go-ahead RBIs throughout the season.

Florida’s offensive success picked up during the final 18 SEC games of the season. As a team, they slashed .296/.406/.500 to go with 26 homers and 32 stolen bases during that stretch.

Jeroloman, a former Auburn baseball palyer, entered the coaching ranks in 2008 as an assistant for Palm Beach Central (FL) HS before moving to college in 2012. He’s had stints at TCU (volunteer assistant), University of Jacksonville and USF (he served as the recruiting coordinator for both) before arriving at Florida in 2020.

It’s unclear how many Tennessee outsiders Elander will choose to bring onto his staff. His ties with Jeroloman run deep, but he did mention in his introductory press conference that he’d like to keep things in-house as much as possible.

“This is the first time I’ve ever done this. But my focus is to take care of the people in the building first, not worry about anything externally,” Elander said on building his staff.

“I think we have some of the best people in what they do at their positions, so they need to be taken care of the right way, and that’s my main and sole focus with all the roots we have. I’m just excited because we want stability for these guys in the building.”

Now, Elander and Jeroloman will spearhead Tennessee baseball’s efforts into the future following the departure of former head coach Tony Vitello. They’ll begin the 2026 season on Feb. 27 against UCLA.