Greg Ryan out after 10 seasons as Michigan Women's Soccer coach
A bizarre time to announce this but near halftime of tonight's MBB game, it was announced by Warde Manuel that Greg Ryan would no longer be the head coach of the Michigan Women's Soccer program.
We finished 6-6-6 this season, but the season was doomed by a boatload of injuries to starters.
Michigan did not win a single championship in Ryan's 10 seasons. The closest the team ever came was in 2013, finishing runner-up in the B1G regular season and advancing to the NCAA Quarterfinals, just one win shy of the College Cup.
Since that 2013 season however, things slipped quite a bit-
| Season | Overall | B1G | Finish | B1G Tournament | NCAA Tournament |
| 2014 | 12-5-3 | 8-2-3 | 3rd | First Round | Did Not Qualify |
| 2015 | 12-7-2 | 6-3-2 | 5th | Semifinals | Did Not Qualify |
| 2016 | 10-5-5 | 6-3-2 | 4th | Semifinals | First Round |
| 2017 | 6-6-6 | 3-5-3 | 10th | Did Not Qualify | Did Not Qualify |
40-17-16 but just 23-13-10 in B1G play, one NCAA apperance that resulted in a First Round upset loss at home to Illinois State via penalty kicks.
Greg Ryan was the US Women's National Team coach from 2005-07 and was criticized heavily as being too much of a defensive coach. That doesn't surprise me as that was his style here as well, as evidenced by the SIX ties this season. He finished one tie short of tying his predecessor in career ties by a Michigan head coach.
Greg Ryan is only the second coach in the program's 24 year history. He replaced the retiring Debbie Rademacher in 2007. Ryan finished his time at Michigan with a 103-64-36 record and the program leader in win percentage (.596).
According to the short press release, "a national search will begin immediately".
January 25th, 2018 at 10:26 PM ^
January 25th, 2018 at 10:26 PM ^
January 25th, 2018 at 10:38 PM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 7:46 AM ^
January 25th, 2018 at 10:46 PM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 7:38 AM ^
January 25th, 2018 at 10:26 PM ^
Well, that 6-6-6 record was not a good omen, on a couple of levels.
January 25th, 2018 at 10:39 PM ^
I guess I'm not shocked by this, but I am a bit saddened. Ryan did a lot of good things here, and it always seemed like this team was right on the cusp of greatness. We just never quite got there, at least in terms of championships - that 2013 squad was pretty dang awesome, though.
To his credit, he did assemble some pretty solid talent in A2. Whoever the next coach is, they'll have plenty to work with, and we should be hopeful for significant results early on.
January 26th, 2018 at 10:29 AM ^
He had a lot of flaws. He assembled a lot of talent but he played every game with an underdog defensive strategy. Michigan could hang with any team in the country but also lose to almost any team. He had way too many random losses to bottom of the barrel teams and struggled to win on the road.
It's nice to have a talent advantage but when you play like a "bunker down and hope to steal a goal" strategy predominately used by massive under dogs what is the point? He switched arguably his best offensive player to defense this past year. They had the roster to be really good and instead went 6-6-6(!).
Overall his results were mediocre. This year he had a roster to win big and went .500 (they had some injuries, but so does every team).
January 25th, 2018 at 11:12 PM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 9:31 AM ^
I really, really, really, really like Alex Morgan.
January 26th, 2018 at 12:59 AM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 7:57 AM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 8:34 AM ^
Coach Burns was suddenly and unjustly "forced to resign" in the Brandon purge. He's a great coach and a solid dude. Took the men's team to the College Cup. Don't know if he wants to coach anymore, or if he is interested in coaching women, but it would be good to at least see if he's interested.
January 26th, 2018 at 10:53 AM ^
January 26th, 2018 at 2:06 PM ^