The Comeback ‘Cats
I had the unique, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to coach NCAA Division 1 volleyball in the storied Big Ten Conference. But there was a catch: the team I was inheriting was the ‘Bad News Bears’ of the league.
Once a prominent top-20 program in the ‘80s, the Northwestern Volleyball Team had grown accustomed to finishing at the bottom of the league throughout the ‘90s. I was determined to change things in the 2000s.
A Cinderella Story — in Steps
It’s one thing to tell a group of athletes you believe they can win, but it’s another thing when they believe it by actually winning.
In my first season, we only won six matches, but two of the victories were significant. We opened Big Ten play by hosting defending national champion and #3 Penn State, and somehow pulled off a huge upset. It was the first victory over a top-five opponent ever. Talk about a big step forward.
However, our chariot turned swiftly back into a pumpkin, as we didn’t win another match until the very last one of the season. But it was meaningful: we beat in-state rival and perennial Big Ten conference power Illinois in another five-set thriller. While it wasn’t as headline-grabbing as the Penn State win, ending the season with a victory was another critical step in shifting the overall mindset and setting a new standard for success.
The Right Stuff
A major obstacle to rebuilding was not having many available scholarships. It’s kind of like starting a new job that’s on a hiring freeze – you want to bring in great new talent, but the headcount isn’t available. The other hurdle was getting the attention of the country’s best talent with years and years of losing records. We didn’t have a great “on-court” product to sell.
But we did have some pretty compelling lures that other programs couldn’t compete with – excellent academics (a top-10 ranking), a great location (Chicago), and the premier conference for the sport (the Big Ten). So I built a narrative around those differentiators and focused my recruiting on a specific athlete (a persona in marketing speak) who would be the most receptive to that pitch.
And it worked. We signed two consecutive top-15 recruiting classes, including 4 high school All-Americans, and 1 National Player of the Year. Constraints be damned!
Coaching All-Big Ten performer Christie Gardner. A rare moment when she was listening to me :)
Dancing Shoes
In 2002 we had a great season and earned the program’s first NCAA postseason bid in almost two decades, just two years into the transformation. We fell to Missouri in the first round, but we were now recognized as a competitive program. We also gained a ton of respect in the Big Ten, finishing in the upper half for the first time since winning the conference in 1984. The next season (2003) was equally as successful, and we once again made the NCAA Tournament, proving we weren’t a one-hit-wonder.
But despite the successful turnaround, I was ready to move on. So I said farewell to the profession, grateful for the rare opportunity to coach at that level – and for the athletes who believed in the vision and helped achieve what many thought was impossible.
We were one of 64 teams selected to the NCAA tournament in my final two seasons. Before that, Northwestern had not made the postseason in 1984.