This week's episode features Rachel Flanagan. Rachel is in her 14th season as head coach of the women's hockey program at the University of Guelph. During her first 13 seasons as head coach, Coach Flanagan has taken the Gryphon women's hockey program to new heights, securing the school's first ever national title in 2018-19 while capturing a total of three OUA titles (2018-19, 2016-17 & 2015-16). In the process, Rachel has been named OUA Coach of the Year on five separate occasions while compiling a record of 250-79-21 through her first 13 seasons in charge. In May of 2019, Rachel was also named the top female coach in the OUA from across all OUA-governed sports, marking the second time in a three-year span she had received the conference-wide honour.
Rachel started at the University of Guelph as head coach in the 2007 season. She graduated from U of G in 2003 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Human Kinetics. During her playing career as a Gryphon she earned OUA all-star status while captaining the women’s hockey team for two of her five years. Following graduation, she received her Bachelor of Education at Lakehead University. Rachel is an NCCP High Performance Level 2 coach and has also completed her Masters in Leadership at the University of Guelph’s Lang School of Business and Economics.
Rachel spent two seasons as player/coach for a Div. 1 English Premier Women’s Hockey team as well as playing for the Great Britain Women’s National Team during that time. In the summers of 2010 and 2011, Rachel was named assistant coach with Canada’s National Women’s Under-22 Team and attended 2 International events with the team (MLP Cup 2010, MECO Cup 2011). In 2013 she was an assistant coach for the Gold medal winning Canadian FISU team (Italy) and in February of 2017 served as Canada's head coach at the FISU games in Kazakhstan, leading the team to a silver medal.
During her tenure as head coach she has helped develop three OUA Rookies of the Year, two OUA Players of the Year, one U SPORTS Rookie of the Year, one U SPORTS Player of the Year, 25 conference All-Stars, 6 U SPORTS All-Canadians, three U SPORTS tournament All-Stars, and two league scoring champions.
Rachel resides in Guelph with her husband, Jeff, and their two boys, Cylus and Cullen.
In our conversation, we cover several topics, including the following:
-Rachel's experience as a player/coach
-Female empowerment in sport
-How becoming a mom has impacted her approach to coaching
-Being married to another coach
-The value of coaches having coaches
-What it felt like to win a National Championship
