From Harvard to Horned Frog. That’s the transition record-breaking Crimson quarterback Jaden Craig ’26 is making.
Craig finished his eligibility at Harvard on a down note with the 52-7 defeat to Villanova on November 29, 2025, in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) post-season playoffs. Having concluded his academic coursework in Cambridge, he is now enrolling at Texas Christian University (TCU) in Fort Worth, Texas, as a so-called “grad transfer,” a development first reported by the Crimson. The expectation is that Craig will be the starting quarterback for the Horned Frogs (that is, their mascot) when they kick off the 2026 season in the fall.
The move represents a step up in class for the two-time All-Ivy signal caller. TCU plays in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) as a member of the Big 12, one of college football’s so-called Power Four conferences. To get there, Craig entered his name in the NCAA’s transfer portal, indicating his availability as a potential graduate transfer for an additional season of college football.
Craig quickly found a taker at TCU, whose starting quarterback in 2025, Josh Hoover, is transferring to suddenly-mighty Indiana. This past season the Horned Frogs were 9-4 and played in the Alamo Bowl, where they outlasted Southern Cal 30-27.
The graduate transfer rule was established in 2018, one of the many features of the new, Wild West atmosphere of college sports. It essentially rewards student-athletes who have run out of eligibility at their school by allowing them to get an additional year of competition at another school that will accept them. (The Ivy League does not accept grad transfers for athletic competition.)
Several former star Harvard players have taken advantage of the rule and played elsewhere, most notably kick returner Justice Shelton-Mosley ’19 (Vanderbilt), tight end Tyler Neville ’24 (Virginia), and defensive lineman Thor Griffith ’24 (Louisville). This past season, receiver Cooper Barkate ’26 became a star at Duke as a grad transfer. More players from Harvard’s 2025 team are expected to follow Craig’s lead in the coming weeks.
Andrew Aurich, the Stephenson family head coach for Harvard football, thinks the move will benefit both Craig and TCU. “I see him being able to fit in right away, whatever the dynamics are of the roster at TCU,” says Aurich. “They do a really good job of putting the quarterback in situations to be really successful, and Jaden’s a really good decision maker.”
Still, Aurich, who also has coached at the FBS level and in the NFL, knows that it may take a while for Craig to adjust. “The speed that he saw from a few defensive guys in the Ivy League,” Aurich says, “he’ll see from everyone in the Big 12.”
Craig’s grad transfer stint will be a showcase for NFL scouts who may be skeptical of his Ivy pedigree. For sure, he had done all he could on Soldiers Field. Craig was an integral member of teams that shared three Ivy championships. He established new Crimson career records with 52 touchdown passes and 6,074 yards gained through the air. Craig threw for more than 300 yards five times.
Gaudy as they are, the statistics don’t fully do him justice. This past season against Penn, he calmly directed a stirring march in the final 22 seconds to set up a game-winning field goal that clinched a share of the league title.
Craig is in the discussion for the best Harvard quarterback of all time. Perhaps only Ryan Fitzpatrick ’05 surpasses him. What is undeniable is that Craig sported the best arm in the program’s 151 seasons. In football parlance, Craig has all the throws. He can rifle the ball or prettily feather it. He can fit passes into tight windows. He can loft long bombs that drop right into the hands of streaking receivers. His rapport with favorite targets—the most notable being Barkate—has been almost eerie. He has set a high bar for his successors.
Now he moves onto the big stage, and a more lucrative one. In this new world of big-time college sports, schools can legally pay student-athletes (Harvard does not), who also can earn money through NIL (Name, Image and Likeness) deals. Some reports have FBS schools putting together financial packages worth a minimum of $1 million for starting quarterbacks. We have no idea if Craig has partaken of such booty. Then again, his concentration at Harvard was economics.
We wish him well—as potential new fans of the Horned Frogs.
