East County Sports

Hawks Coach ‘K’ hailed for 400 wins

2021-22 SAN DIEGO CHRISTIAN WOMEN’S VOLLEYBALL

From staff and wire reports

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — San Diego Christian College women’s volleyball head coach Gene Krieger has been recognition by the NAIA national office for capturing his 400th career victory over this past season.

Krieger was presented his citation at the recent convention of the American Volleyball Coaches Association, held in Omaha,Neb., in December. He is the 31st coach to reach the milestone.

The landmark includes all head coaching wins he has achieved at the NAIA and NCAA Division II levels. He has led the resurgent Hawks program for the past two seasons and accomplished this incredible milestone during the 2021-22 season. He is currently at 413 indoor wins and counting; his record in beach volleyball is excluded.

Krieger has brought San Diego Christian volleyball program back to prominence in a very short period. In his first season with SDCC in 2020-21.

“Coach K” guided the team to their first winning record since 2015-16 in his first season with the Hawks. This past season, Krieger not only produced yet another winning season but also coached the Hawks to a historic victory over national NAIA power Westmont College as well as a season sweep of perennial powerhouse Vanguard University.

“It has been a great adventure traveling to seven different countries with Campus Crusade for Christ and visiting almost every state in the US through volleyball,” said coach Krieger. “I look forward to adding to this count with the Hawks in the coming seasons.”

Krieger’s resume includes coaching success at all levels of college ball, plus 200 victories at the high school level.

His success on the court has translated to many prominent awards. Among them, the veteran is a 3-time NAIA National Coach of the Year and was named NCAA Division II Coach of the Year while at Cal Poly Pomona.

“I won one of the national awards at Cal Baptist,” Krieger recalled. “Then another at Warner Pacific when we won the National Christian (College Athletic Association) title.”

At Warner Pacific, he actually won consecutive CCAA nationals in 1982 and ’83.

There were also a pair of regional awards when leading Cal Poly Pomona to a pair of crowns in the powerful California Collegiate Athletic Association to advance to the NCAA Division II nationals.

“In 1991, when we won the CCAA for the first time, that was definitely the most intense conference expereince of my life,” he added. “We had some incredible coaches who are now head coaches at major universities like Arizona and Michigan.”

Krieger came to San Diego Christian after leading Hawai’i-Hilo to nationals.

SDCC, under the school’s old name of Christian Heritage College, won the NCCAA national women’s volleyball title in 1998. The school also owns an NCAA national crown in men’s basketball from 1990.

— Staff writer Nick Pellegrino contributed to this report.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *