Matthew Fritsche was named Hillsdale College’s seventh head women’s basketball coach on Tuesday. Fritsche joins the Chargers after serving four years as the assistant women’s basketball coach at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska.
During his tenure at Creighton, the lady Bluejays made the Division-I NCAA tournament every year from 2014-2017 and had an overall record of 78-54.
Fritsche graduated from the University of Nebraska-Kearney with a degree in education in 1999. He went on to receive a Master’s of Education in Educational Leadership from Doane College.
In 2001, Fritsche began a 10 year stint as head varsity girls basketball coach for Bellevue West High School in Nebraska. He led his teams to four state championship appearances, winning the title game in 2007, 2009, and 2010. From 2009 to 2011, Fritsche won coach of the year awards from nine different organizations in Nebraska.
Fritsche was the head women’s basketball coach at Midland University for one season before joining the coaching staff at Creighton.
Hillsdale College athletic director Don Brubacher said Fritsche has three key qualities that made him the best candidate: an understanding of and willingness to carry out the mission of the college, the ability to provide a great experience for his student athletes, and the expertise needed to win games.
“We have high hopes,” Brubacher said.
Although Fritsche and his family are moving from a Division-I program in Omaha, Nebraska, to rural Hillsdale with a population of less than 10,000, he is looking forward to the new setting and believes the whole change to be a net positive.
“I wouldn’t even call it a move down. I would just call it a move up for my family cause I wanted to be a head coach and I wanted a small town. Division-II is just a little more family friendly as far as our summer access and things like that are concerned,” Fritsche said. “I think I could be a really good dad and a really good coach at the same time at this level.”