Matt Werle spent 13 years at Grand Canyon teaching the lads’s volleyball crew and efficient instantly he would be the girls’s volleyball Affiliate Head Coach at Kansas. GCU assistant coaches Bryan Dell’Amico and Jon Girten will run this system for the remainder of the 2025 season. “GCU can be in nice arms transferring ahead. Obligations throughout matches will stay comparable attempting to get rid of any additional change. Coach Girten, Coach Dell’Amico and Volunteer Coach Toben will take the perfect care of those athletes transferring ahead,” mentioned Werle.
When Werle first arrived to GCU he was an assistant coach and finally was elevated to the pinnacle teaching function. The Antelopes had been within the MIVA when Werle began up as a head coach they usually made the transfer to the MPSF.
Originally, Werle was taking a comparatively younger program looking for their identification and battling high ten opponents on a nightly foundation. Through the years with Werle’s ardour, drive, grit and talent to recruit, the Antelopes had been one of many high NCAA Division I-II applications within the nation. Within the 2024 and 2023 season Werle led the Antelopes to the NCAA event.
Throughout the 2024 season GCU earned an AVCA primary rating, their first program victory within the NCAA event and was named the MPSF and AVCA Coach of the Yr. “The athletes have simply been the perfect a part of GCU. It has been an absolute pleasure constructing the relationships with the athletes over time and GCU giving me the chance to make use of volleyball as that platform to attach with them. It has allowed me to look at them turn out to be husbands and fathers. I used to be even given the privilege to officiate a few their weddings. The opposite factor that I’ll miss about GCU is the uphill battle. We by no means had essentially the most nationally revered title within the males’s volleyball world, so it was additionally enjoyable battling in opposition to the perfect,” mentioned Werle.
Coach Werle was capable of mirror on his time at GCU and focus on his determination why he chosen to hitch the KU employees. “As exhausting as this was to depart GCU at the moment, it’s the proper transfer for my profession with trajectory of girls’s volleyball. The help KU gives for his or her athletics and girls’s volleyball could be very particular. What Matt Ulmer was capable of do at Oregon was very particular and I’m extraordinarily lucky to be taught from him transferring ahead. Not solely is that this the best transfer for my profession, however that is such a optimistic transfer for my household. We have now prolonged household in Kansas Metropolis together with extra household two hours away. The employees is bringing 9 youngsters to Lawrence all below the age of 11. A smaller city can be so wholesome for our household!”
One of many many gifted student-athletes that Werle dropped at GCU expressed his gratitude to the coach, “Matt was one of many largest causes I got here to GCU. He trusted me on the courtroom, I had essentially the most belief in him as a coach,” mentioned Christian Janke, a 4 yr starter for the Antelopes from 2019-2023 and 2022 second crew AVCA All-American award winner.
Through the years Werle turned a extremely revered coach and continued to usher in high stage recruits. “He let his gamers play and extra belief was instilled in us over time. Matt grew to understand how essential the chemistry of the crew was. One of the best years we had weren’t simply because we had the perfect gamers, it was us turning into higher teammates and never counting on Matt to carry us accountable,” mentioned Janke.
Previous to teaching Werle was a setter on the Division III males’s volleyball powerhouse Juniata School. In his senior season, Werle went up within the NCAA championship in opposition to Carthage School, who was led by setter Matt Ulmer. Ulmer’s squad jumped out to a two set to zero lead. Werle and his Eagle teammates shifted the momentum of the match and gained the NCAA championship with a reverse sweep! Werle and Ulmer gained appreciation of one another and saved in contact after that match.
Ulmer landed an amazing alternative to be on the Lengthy Seashore State’s girls’s volleyball employees. Whereas at Lengthy Seashore Ulmer coached exterior hitter Sarah Clause, who’s now fortunately married to Matt Werle with two youngsters, Palmer and Krew.
At Lengthy Seashore, Ulmer discovered success teaching indoor as an assistant for 5 seasons and gained a 2013 nationwide championship because the seashore volleyball head coach. Whereas at Oregon he spent his time as an assistant and was promoted to the pinnacle teaching function in 2017. Throughout his time as the pinnacle coach at Oregon, Ulmer had instant success. He had a .683 profitable share and led the Geese to seven NCAA event appearances and went to a few Elite Eights.
After the legendary Ray Burchard introduced that he was retiring from Kansas College, Director of Athletics Travis Goff went on a nationwide search to search out the Jayhawks’ subsequent head coach. With Ulmer’s observe file as a head coach KU was thrilled to rent him. Rapidly Ulmer began placing collectively his employees and he wished to make a splashy rent. “Coach Matt Werle was a bucket record rent for me. He’s a gifted coach, I knew I’d be fortunate to work with him if the timing was proper,” mentioned Ulmer.
The Kansas employees is now full below the steering of Head Coach Matt Ulmer. Erika Dillard (Affiliate Head Coach/Defensive Coordinator), Matt Werle (Affiliate Head Coach/Offensive Coordinator), Arica Nassar (Assistant Coach/Recruiting Coordinator), Maggie Bowen (Director of Operations) and Tori Miller-Hohlios (Technical Coordinator).
Over the previous decade there appears to be a development of girls’s volleyball applications hiring coaches on the lads’s facet. Ulmer went that route and defined what Werle goes to be doing with the Jayhawks,
“Matt Werle is likely one of the finest head coaches within the nation. He’ll dabble into every part in our program. I anticipate him to shortly acclimate to the ladies’s recreation. Within the fitness center I’m excited to see what he can implement to our offense.”
Coach Werle is fired up and as much as the duty of getting the Jayhawks to be top-of-the-line offenses within the nation. “Coach Ulmer has introduced me on to assist run the offense. He and I had been each collegiate setters, so there can be numerous collaboration transferring ahead. I hope to deliver a quick tempo offense with steadiness and a strategic plan. GCU’s offense is one thing that we had been identified for, so I hope we are able to create some comparable pleasure to the KU offense,” mentioned Werle.
On a private be aware, I’ve been round Coach Werle and adopted his crew for years. Werle recruited closely out of San Diego, CA and I coached lots of his student-athletes that had been on the 2023 and 2024 squad. He was all the time skilled, pushed and labored exhausting on the recruiting path. Once I checked in with my former athletes at GCU they all the time spoke extremely of Coach Werle. Job properly carried out Coach Ulmer, you made a homerun rent with Matt Werle. Coach Werle, I tip my hat to you and want you the perfect of luck at KU. Rock Chalk Jayhawk Coach Werle!
What They Are Saying About Coach Werle:
“There may be not a doubt in my thoughts that Matt will excel in each class as a coach at Kansas. That crew is destined for achievement the second he walks within the door. Couldn’t be prouder and extra excited for him to do what’s finest for him and his household. Matt deserves all of it for all that he has carried out for us,” mentioned Christian Janke.
“Watching Matt transfer on to Kansas College Ladies’s Volleyball fills me with immense satisfaction. Not solely has he been a really shut good friend, however working alongside him in USAV has been one of many highlights of my profession. His influence on the lads’s recreation and at GCU will definitely be missed, however Coach Ulmer and Kansas are fortunate to have somebody as devoted, passionate, and gifted as Matt. Wishing him, Sarah, and the children all the perfect on this thrilling new chapter! Hold a room open for Julie and I to go to! I’m now a brand new fan of Jayhawk Volleyball,” mentioned John Hawks, UCLA Head Coach.
“Matt did a implausible job at GCU. He constructed that program all the best way as much as the highest. His loyalty to this system and diligent work actually made a huge effect on GCU, Arizona volleyball and males’s volleyball. At Kansas his values match rather well. Matt Ulmer can also be a implausible coach. They may do nice issues there to proceed to construct an elite program in a hotbed of volleyball expertise in Kansas. They’ll educate the sport, see it creatively because it’s performed on the highest ranges and are confirmed to recruit high expertise. They’re properly positioned to succeed there for a very long time,” mentioned Jonathan Winder, Pepperdine Head Coach.
Kevin Pratte has enthusiastically been concerned in volleyball for over 23 years. Pratte began enjoying in center college and was lucky sufficient to play NCAA Division 1 volleyball at The College of the Pacific. After his enjoying profession Pratte obtained concerned in teaching volleyball. In 2009 Pratte was the graduate assistant coach for the College of Nebraska girls’s volleyball program. Later in his profession Pratte made teaching stops at College of the Pacific, a number of neighborhood schools and coached at WAVE Volleyball Membership for seven years. Presently Pratte is a bodily schooling instructor within the San Diego Unified College District, San Diego Downtown Breakfast Rotary member, a school volleyball recruiting coordinator, hosts a volleyball podcast present, the proprietor of the Center Hitter web site and runs a non-profit group to assist increase funds to provide boys’ highschool volleyball college students scholarships to play membership volleyball. He’s excited to proceed writing for Volleyball Journal and is keen to cowl the sport.
Basis web site: www.kevinprattefoundation.com
Center Hitter Web site: www.middlehitter.com
KP HERE Podcast: Spotify