AUBURN, Ala. – Sara Carver-Milne, who has spent the last 20 years as head coach at Brown University, has been named associate head coach for Auburn gymnastics, head coach Jeff Graba announced.
"I am so grateful for the opportunity to join the Auburn Family and coach this impressive team," Carver-Milne said. "I have followed the success of this program under Jeff's leadership for many years. The culture created by Jeff, Kurt (Hettinger) and Dawn (Schueller) was echoed by Director of Athletics Allen Greene and Marcy Girton and everyone I met in the Auburn Athletics community.
"I look forward to helping this program continue to compete at the highest level by building relationships and truly working together in a positive and competitive environment."
Carver-Milne comes to the Plains after spending the last 21 seasons at Brown University. She was named ECAC Conference Head Coach of the Year twice during her career and improved Brown's RQS by seven points since taking over the program, breaking every individual and team record during her tenure.
Most recently, she guided her 2022 team to school records in overall score, vault, bars and floor.
"I have known Sara for years and she is not only an amazing coach, but also a perfect fit for our program," Graba said. "She is a veteran coach who has developed some of the best teams in her conference. Fostering a positive and supportive team culture is also extremely important to Sara and matches our desire to be great at that as well. The Auburn Family will absolutely love her coaching style and I believe our student-athletes will continue to improve under her leadership."
She is no stranger to recruiting and coaching some of the world's top gymnasts as she coached Olympian and World Champion Alicia Sacramone in 2007.
Carver-Milne coached the Bears to an ECAC championship in 2014 and back-to-back Ivy League titles in 2013 and 2014 as well as in 2016. She has guided her gymnasts to numerous USAG All-America honors, including a pair of USAG national champions in Mei Li Costa (2019 – bars) and Diana Walters (2014 – all-around).
She has guided her gymnasts to 10 individual ECAC championships and three conference Gymnast of the Year awards. She's coached 14 NCAA regional qualifiers, including Sacramone who qualified for the NCAA championship with a regional floor victory.
In addition, her athletes have exceled in the classroom, earning multiple WCGA Scholastic All-America honors, ECAC and USA Gymnastics All-Academic awards and Academic All-Ivy recognitions.
Prior to Brown, Carver-Milne was a gymnast for 18 years and coached elite-level club teams in Texas. A 1997 graduate of Alaska-Anchorage, Carver-Milne was a NCAA gymnast and national competitor. She earned a bachelor's degree in Journalism and Public Communications.